Annabeth's Curse
by DemiSpy
Summary: Do not provoke the sun god. Ever. Apollo thought cursing me would be the best way to get back at my mom. I thought otherwise—so did Dad. After I ran away, a boy named Percy found me in a park. His school took me in. I thought I'd escaped, found something permanent. Stupid seven-year-old me. You can't run from the Fates, nor from yourself. You keep up. Rewrite of my old story. AU
1. Prologue

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything Rick Riordan owns, nor do I own anything you may recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

* * *

**Prologue**

* * *

"Music is useless!"

Her voice rang loud in the throne room, resonant above all the others' voices. All chatter ceased as ten pairs of immortal eyes turned to look at the goddess of wisdom, who was hardly fazed by the sudden attention.

No, her eyes were concentrated in boring holes into the sun god's forehead, whose expression slowly morphed from that typical carefree gaze of his to pure, white-hot fury. He spoke through clenched teeth: "What—did—you—say?"

With those few words he'd given her a chance, one every other person in the room wanted her to take.

She obviously didn't take it. Instead, Athena raised an eyebrow, defiant. "If you have such an ear for music, I doubt you're deaf. You heard me. Music is _useless_."

Everyone held their breaths. They all knew Apollo: he was calm, cool, collected; he had an odd sense of humor and wrote terrible haikus. Anger never was his sort of thing. But, dear Rhea, was he angry.

"Take that back," he spat.

Athena's glare intensified. "I don't see why I should."

Before either of his children could do anything rash, Zeus stood up. "Silence!" He glared at Apollo and Athena. "I don't know what petty argument you two are having—nor do I want to know—but I forbid you to continue it!" He turned to look at Athena, his darling daughter. "I expected better of you, daughter. You have shown no wisdom today."

Athena stood up. Dark storms seemed to brew in her eyes, and her rigid posture and clenched fists added to her menacing aura. "Forgive me, Father," she said. "My behavior has been out of character"—she glared at Apollo—"but I can assure you: not without reason. Excuse me." In a burst of smoke and ash, she was gone.

Zeus turned to his son, who was still glaring intently at the remaining cloud of ash. "Do you have anything to say?"

Apollo continued glaring at Athena's throne, and said in a strained tone: "Nothing of consequence." In a bright beam of light, and a faint sound of lyres, the sun god made his exit.

The gods looked at one another. Artemis was the first to speak up, "It's been long since my brother last acted like this." She sighed. "Let us hope he does nothing rash."

By the uneasy mutters going around the room, it was easy to tell everyone was thinking the same thing: _Yeah, right._

* * *

Even though the other gods considered him a bit of a clown, Apollo knew himself to be rather intelligent. One simply cannot live so many centuries and learn nothing. Of course, he hid this quality very well. Look at Athena! One cannot be smart, show-off this fact, and _not _become as stuck-up and annoying as she. It's against the laws of nature! Yes sir, Apollo knew he was clever in that sense. He liked to have fun, and so fun he had.

But now, said wisdom goddess had committed the crime of all crimes. Even now, three hours after their yelling match, Apollo still fumed. How dare that woman say such an insult?! How dare she?! For starters, it had been _she _who started their argument. Indirectly, yes, but she started it all the same. How can she walk out of an argument _she _caused holding the upper hand?

Darn that woman to the pits of Tartarus for being so clever.

He simply couldn't allow her to get away with this. He just couldn't. And so came forth his plan.

Apollo knew he was playing with fire. He also knew that maybe, possibly, he would regret this later. _Much_ later, mind you. He didn't particularly care at the moment, and besides, it wasn't _his _fault that Athena was pregnant at the moment—and thank Rhea for that—, so it was almost as if she were _begging _him to pull this off. With that thought in mind, and a grin plastered on his face, Apollo began his work.

He would prove music to be very useful—even if it was the last thing he did.

This thought brought his body to a sudden jerk. Come to think of it… if he really _did _pull this off, Athena was sure to kill him. Well, maim him. Very painfully. And slowly.

Apollo pondered the thought for a total of two seconds before reaching a simple conclusion: _Eh_, _who cares?_

* * *

**AN:**

**After nearly two years of having abandoned the original version of this story, I've finally gathered the guts to work on and post the newer, better, **_**actually outlined**_** version of it. Welcome! May this story actually reach the finish line! May it be free of OOCness and all those ugly things that haunt writerly nightmares all over!**

**I'll do my best to post weekly. The story should shape up to about twenty chapters (all of which will be much, much lengthier than this), part of which is already pre-written. So, I'll see you next week, and then the week after that and so on and so forth… until week #20!**

**But we're on week one. So let's not get too ahead of ourselves. Ahem. In the meantime, review? It'd make me smile!**

**-DemiSpy.**


	2. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything Rick Riordan owns, nor do I own anything you may recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

* * *

**Chapter 1**

* * *

Something about kindergarten music class always put me off, though to this day I'm not sure what.

Maybe my six-year-old self was already half-conscious of my curse at the time, or maybe I really did have an aversion to music as a kid. It's hard to tell.

What I do know, however, is that I was kicked out of the class. Whereas _now _I'm thankful for that, being kicked out of my classmates' favorite class was a low blow to my kid ego. I think that what hit the hardest was that I _knew _I was a daughter of Athena—shouldn't her children be the best in class? _Every _class?

That was my train of thought back then, anyway. I wasn't kicked out of that class immediately—no. It was a long series of events that eventually led to my teacher (and my classmates, come to think of it) deeming me _hazardous _for the class.

I'm not joking. My six-year-old self was deemed _hazardous _to a class. _Music _class. My pride never fully recovered.

The first of these events is the one I can remember to perfection. See, it started the day our teacher, Mrs. Lin, taught us about the musical scale. You know, Do, Re, Mi, Fa… etc. I, seated beside my twenty-one classmates on the rug, faced Mrs. Lin, listening intently.

Mrs. Lin held pointed to the piano at the end of the room. "The piano follows the musical scale. Because it has so many keys, the musical scale repeats itself every time it is completed, but the sound of each note is different."

It was the third time she'd tried to explain the concept, but none of my classmates understood her completely. Melanie Stone was the first to ask this time. "But if the same notes repeat, how can they be different?"

Mrs. Lin seemed about ready to burst as she watched us all nod along to Melanie's words. "Let's try something else," she said. "Most singers use the musical scale to perform exercises to warm up their voices. They start at Do with a low tone of voice, and reach Si with a higher tone. Would anyone like to try?"

Jessica's hand was the first in the air. Mrs. Lin nodded and called on her. "Alright, Jessica," she said. "Follow my lead." Jessica nodded, and so they began. Jessica's tone was rather off, though now that I think about it, she did rather well for her first try.

I let my eyes wander around the classroom, wondering how much time was left. I had nothing against music class, but it was simply… boring, I suppose. We didn't do anything too interesting. Plus, we were forbidden to touch the instruments (we could barely _look _at them without Mrs. Lin glaring our way), and something about the place gave me a very odd sensation in the pit of my stomach.

"Annabeth, how about you?"

Mrs. Lin's voice caught me off guard. I turned to look at her with a confused expression, to which Mrs. Lin sighed. "Please pay attention in class, Annabeth." A few quiet gasps went around the room—teachers never, ever called on me like that. I couldn't blame Mrs. Lin, seeing as I really _wasn't _paying attention that time, but I glared at her all the same when I heard a few giggles behind me.

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Lin," I said in what I considered a steely tone. But, really, how steely can a six-year-old's voice be?

Mrs. Lin sighed for the umpteenth time. "As I was saying, Annabeth, why don't you try and sing the musical scale? Like Jessica did earlier, something I _hope _you paid attention to."

I openly glared at her right then and there. Mrs. Lin knew I wasn't too fond of her class, and she loved to make sure I had a bad time. "Sure," I said, just to prove that I had, in fact, heard Jessica. But then I was halfway through standing up from my spot on the rug, and I realized what I was getting into. _Wait, what? _I thought as I rose to my full (yet not so great) height.

Everyone was looking at me expectantly. "Well?" Mrs. Lin said. I was positive that horns and a spiked tail were sprouting from her. "Go on."

As a child, I liked to sing. But I never did it in public. I didn't sing in the car, I didn't hum under my breath when I was bored, and I certainly didn't sing during music class. I only sang in the solitude and comfort of my bedroom back at home, where Dad and Jane were too busy minding the twins to bother me.

Panic and slight nerves were about to overcome me, but then I saw it: Mrs. Lin's expression. She had a look of sick satisfaction—she knew I was chickening out. My pride got in the way of things, and I shot her a defying look. "Do," I sang slowly, "Re, Mi, Fa," I picked up speed as my pitch went higher and higher, "Sol, La—"

A high-pitched cry cut me off.

Jerked by the sound of Kate's cry (no other classmate of mine could cry out in such a way—I was positive she would be singing opera when she was a grownup), I turned to look at her. My classmate's faces were scrunched up in either pain, confusion, or plain idiocy. Mark, one of the youngest kids in my classroom, had a trail of drool going down his chin as he stared at the wall with curious eyes, as if the poorly painted concrete walls were the most interesting ever.

Mrs. Lin looked completely out of sorts as she stared down at me. Her lips were stretched into a creepy grin and her eyes wide and unfocused. Her left eye twitched.

Scared, and kind of freaked out, I backed into the wall. I collided with a set of bongos, and tripped over them. I gasped as I fell over, knocking down one of the small tables. A trumpet and a flute fell beside me, creating a dry clang as they hit the tile floor.

The noise seemed to snap everyone out of their trance, and just then, the bell rang. Mrs. Lin looked at me with a murderous glare, taking in the small mess I'd created. "Annabeth," she said slowly (now _that's _a steely tone), "go sit in time-out until your teacher arrives. I'd like to have a word with him."

I gulped and walked over to the time-out corner.

Three hours later, I went home with a note for my dad. It read that I could very well be suspended from music class, seeing as _repeated incidents of similar nature have proven your daughter to be hazardous to the class._

I told you I wasn't joking.

* * *

Ever since my first incident during music class, some strange things happened to me. Music seemed to haunt me, in every sense of the word. At this point, my "fits" started. My first one was at home, during dinner. Every time I remember the looks on Dad and Jane's faces, I cringe and bite my tongue.

See, it was a Saturday evening and Dad was talking to Jane about a possible business trip the next week. Meanwhile, Bobby and Matthew cried for their attention rather obnoxiously, and I mindlessly pushed my food around the plate with my fork, begging the gods to shut my brothers—_stepbrothers_—up.

I didn't feel all that great, and I was positive I was going pale, but no one had noticed so far. Even though I have no recollection of this happening, Dad told me that it all went down more or less like this:

First up, I dropped my fork rather suddenly, and it clattered noisily onto my plate, which grabbed everyone's attention. My eyes were unfocused and my lips slightly parted. I was breathing rather loudly, according to Dad (Jane had the gall to say I sounded like a zombie from some movie).

"Annabeth?" Dad called.

Of course, I didn't register that while in my trance. I stood up from my spot at the dinner table, and began to walk in a slow and awkward manner towards the kitchen. Dad gestured to Jane to stay with the twins, and he followed me.

He said that he found me scribbling on a piece of notepaper, the kind Jane usually sticks to the fridge for shopping lists, on the floor. My six-year-old scrawl was hardly legible, so Dad had no idea what I was writing—or drawing, it seemed to be.

Once I finished whatever I was doing, Dad said I passed out cold on the kitchen floor, clutching my paper in my hands as if my life depended on me. Dad gave up on trying to pry it away from my small fingers, and so he scooped me up in his arms and took me to my room.

In my opinion, I think he forgot the part when Jane either screamed, or asked in a snarky tone if I would be finishing dinner. But maybe that's just me.

I never told either Jane or Dad what I'd written on my little piece of paper (I was pretty sure they'd either forgotten or didn't really care), but through the years it became to mean a lot to me.

The three musical notes I wrote on that piece of paper were my first composition.

* * *

By the time my seventh birthday rolled around, I was used to my "fits" and could easily avoid singing. Dad had talked with someone at school, and made sure that I didn't attend music classes. Even though I felt quite put off by this fact, I knew it was necessary. Still, I didn't like it one bit.

I'd fallen into a routine. Whenever I felt the lightheaded sensation creeping up my neck, I'd excuse myself from wherever I was, and lock myself in the nearest empty room or bathroom. I still passed out after my fits, but thankfully, I usually woke up after a couple minutes clutching a paper in my hands.

Let me tell you something. Passing out in a cramped bathroom stall isn't pretty.

Oh, I didn't quite keep out of trouble (it followed me like a horde of angry bees) but I avoided it to some extent. Jane still turned up her nose at me whenever I excused myself to the bathroom (be it because of a fit or not) but I didn't care anymore. Dad simply made sure I didn't break anything on my way, and that was that.

See, my mother had turned up not too long ago. She somewhat explained my situation (in her words, Apollo had a rather stupid sense of humor) and told me she would deal with Apollo for me. She was the one that suggested I always carry pen and paper, to avoid any awkward situations.

To me, it was the best thing ever to be able to see my mom. Athena—or any god, for that matter—rarely paid her children visits. Even though she'd told me that as subtly as she could, I knew what she meant—I probably wouldn't see her again anytime soon, if ever.

That didn't completely dampen my spirits, though, so I enjoyed the few hours I had with her. I was grateful for it, even if the motive for her visit wasn't the most pleasant.

Not too long after that, Apollo paid me his first visit. It was a few weeks after my birthday number seven, one late Sunday evening. Jane and Dad were in the living room, watching TV with Bobby and Matthew. I was up in my room, reading (well, _trying _to read. I'm dyslexic, mind you), when a sudden light burst in my room. Remembering clearly what had followed the light the last time I saw it, I grinned as I covered my eyes. I thought Mother was visiting me.

Of course, when I opened my eyes, still grinning, I found myself staring up at a man, rather than a woman. He looked to be around nineteen years old, and was smiling down at me, displaying two perfect rows of pearly white teeth.

At the time, I'd pictured him to be some sort of male model.

"Hey there, kiddo," he said.

Stupidly, I didn't answer and continued looking up at him. I mean, seriously. There's a stranger in your room, grinning down at you and calling you kiddo… and the best I do? I stare.

Some daughter of Athena I am.

The man gave me a lopsided grin, and he crouched down to my height. "Hey, don't freak out on me. The name's Apollo. You're Annabeth, right?"

Finally proving myself a daughter of Athena, something clicked in my mind. Apollo. His name was Apollo. _Of course _he was a god—how else would he have appeared like that? The moment that I put the puzzle pieces together in my head, my eyes narrowed, my eyebrows rose, my arms crossed, and my lips pursed themselves into a thin line.

Even for a seven-year-old, I think I looked rather scary. The look on Apollo's face further proved my point, seeing as his grin faltered slightly, and looked rather taken aback.

"You're Apollo," I confirmed. "God of music, poetry, foretelling, medicine, and the sun."

He nodded, suddenly looking flattered. He did some sort of bow. "At your service."

My fingers seemed to be digging holes into my arms. "You cursed me."

Apollo stopped mid-bow, and looked up at me from his strange position. "I wouldn't call it a curse," he said, standing up straight. "It's a gift."

I sat down on my bed, my arms still crossed. "Does a gift make you pass out cold? Make you feel sick? Make your voice rival a banshee's? _Does it_?"

"With great power come great responsibilities," Apollo recited. "…And side effects, too."

I sighed. Mother was right—never mind the fact he was a sun god, he didn't seem to be any brighter than my brothers. "Lord Apollo," I said in a strained tone, "why are you visiting me?"

Apollo looked at me oddly—clearly, he hadn't expected me to let go of the subject so easily. Now that I think about it, I shouldn't have. He very well deserved a little pounding. But instead of inquiring on that, he cleared his throat and sat down next to me on my bed. "You birthday was a couple weeks ago, right?" I nodded. "Well," he said, pulling out a small box from his jacket. "Happy birthday."

I stared at the small yellow box. I took it, somewhat warily, and set it on my lap. Seeing the excited expression on Apollo's face, he somehow reminded me of my brothers on Christmas morning. With that funny thought in mind, I untied the ribbon and set it aside me, and took off the lid.

Gasping quietly, I took out the necklace inside the box. The chain was beautiful. It seemed to be two chains entwined together, one white gold and one pure gold. Its consistence was slippery, somewhat silky. It fell in between my fingers easily, and it was so thin, I could've sworn it would tangle up immediately. It didn't.

The chain's clasp had the shape of a musical note. I think it's called a beamed note, if I recall one of the few music classes I ever had. Half of it stuck to one end of the chain, and the other half with the other end.

"Thank-you," I said after a while. "It's… well, it's beautiful."

And it really was. Even though I had no clue why the sun god would give a seven-year-old (I stress this: a _seven_-year-old)such a beautiful piece of jewelry, I loved it. It was so simple; no pendant or charm… I loved it.

Apollo seemed very, very pleased with himself. "You're welcome, Annabeth. Care to put it on?"

I nodded and smiled. I took the chain in my hands, and clasped it around my neck. I was about to thank Apollo once more when something inside of me faltered. I felt this… this strange sensation in my gut. I guess you could call it lightheaded, but in my stomach, but even that's a bad description. I suddenly felt drained. Not weak, per se, but… _weaker_.

Apollo didn't seem bothered by this in the least. He clapped and grinned. "It works!"

I gave him an incredulous look. So now not only does he curse me—and land the darn side effects on me, too—but he _also _gives me a necklace designed to make me feel… whatever I was feeling.

"No, no," he said, as if he knew what I was thinking. "You misunderstood me. See, I've been watching you for a while now"—oh, so now he's _also _a stalker, I thought.—"and I've noticed that these side effects you mentioned earlier are… what's the word? Bothersome?" He thought to himself for a minute. "Yes, bothersome. So I asked Hephaestus, your sort-of uncle, to help me out with this," he gestured to the necklace.

I nodded. "And how is this supposed to help me?"

Apollo scratched his chin. "It's supposed to contain the… err… essence, let's call it, of your gift. This way, it won't affect you so long as you wear the necklace. You won't be having any of your so-called 'fits' when you wear it, and you can sing and play music just fine and no one will know any different."

I was about to speak up, seeing as he fell silent, but then he interrupted me: "Thing is, you can't just wear it all the time. If you did, the necklace would suffer from some sort of magical buildup. I don't really know how to explain this—I barely understood a word of what Hephaestus told me—but I do know that you have to take it off every now and then. At least once a week—no, scratch that. Once every three days, and that's pushing it." He grinned. "I can't help it—my blessing's are big packages."

"No kidding," I muttered. "Alright, I can do that."

He nodded. "Good. One last thing: I know it'll look weird for you to be wearing something so… nice, I suppose, all the time. So if you want, just will it to turn invisible, and it will. It's practically weightless, so it shouldn't bother you."

I tried that out, squeezing my eyes shut and thinking the necklace wasn't there. Effectively, when I looked down, it wasn't there, but I could still feel the light pressure of the chain against my neck.

I bit my lip. My train of thought was going rather fast at the moment. Swallowing my pride, I admitted to myself: _Okay, so he's not that bad. Not like Mother said… maybe. _Of course, I didn't dare say this aloud, so I simply put on a small smile and thanked Apollo once again.

* * *

Even though it was a short encounter, I hadn't expected to see Apollo anytime soon after that day. And, in a sense, I didn't. It'd be a while until I physically saw him again, but from that day on, I heard him a lot in my dreams, and sometimes in my mind during waking hours.

He became a constant presence in my life, and I was grateful for it, because it was something I really needed back then. Even though I wasn't aware of it, Apollo made a great impact on me. He made sure I remained sane.

See, after that day, I explained to my parents what had happened. They'd been completely oblivious to the fact that there'd been a god in their house, which seemed to anger Jane. "Unsolicited guests," she'd muttered. Dad had been relatively okay with it, but of course, he would _never _say something like that in front of Jane.

Dad put me back into music classes that Fall, and I was very, very pleased to know that Mrs. Lin had quit her job that year. The new music teacher was a nice guy in his mid-thirties. I no longer had anything against music class.

That was the only upside, though. Now that my 'disabilities' were gone, as Jane put it, my stepmother's tolerance levels for me seemed to stoop lower and lower with each passing day. I can't fully recall what exactly made me blow up one day—I think Jane had been messing with my blue notebook, the one I used for my "fits"—but the point is that she crossed the line.

Oh, wait. Never mind, I remember now. Jane _had _gone through my stuff. I think we'd had an argument earlier, but the point is she ripped out a few pages of my notebook. I never knew what she did to them, but I do know I never got my pages back. I got really, really mad at her.

In fact, it's all coming back to me now. I remember it was a Wednesday night, a "fit" day. See, every other day after dinner, I took my necklace off. Consequently, I immediately fell into a fit. So that day, I was looking for my notebook. I'd already closed my door, fixed up my spot on my bed, and had a pen handy.

But I just _couldn't _find my fits notebook. Exasperated, I let ADHD take over me, and I threw over a pile of books that teetered on the edge of my bookshelf. Lo and behold: my fits notebook!

As far as I was concerned, I hadn't left it there on Monday. I didn't dwell on it much, though, and focused on finding a clean page wherever I'd left off. That was when I saw it. When you rip pages out of a spiral notebook, a bit of the torn page usually sticks and stays inside the spiral, right?

Well, there I was, looking down at my notebook's spiral with eyes as wide as saucers, almost glaring at the remnants of what I calculated to be ten pages. My blood began to boil. I breathed in deeply and told myself to calm down for a second. Then, I took my notebook in hand, and set out to look for the culprit.

Fifteen minutes later, Jane found me yelling at the twins. "What's going on in here?" she asked, tearing me away from Bobby and Matthew.

I glared at her. "They won't fess up!"

Bobby, the _talkative _one, looked up at his mommy with big round eyes, and said: "Me no do nothing!"

I rolled my eyes. "Then it was Matthew. Whatever. Just give me back my pages!"

Jane glared at me. "Don't speak to your brother that way, Annabeth."

"_Step_-brother," I corrected.

Jane sighed. She was about to say something, but was interrupted by Dad's voice coming from the doorway. "What happened?" he asked.

Again, Jane was about to speak up, but I cut her off. "One of these… these _nitwits_ took my notebook and destroyed it!" I opened up my notebook just to prove my point.

"I wouldn't call this _destroying_," Dad said, "but, okay. Bobby, Matthew, did either of you take Annabeth's notebook and rip out some of the pages?"

Both of them, being the little devils they are, looked up at Dad with _innocent _gazes and shook their heads. "No, Daddy," they said in unison.

I wanted to rip their hair out.

"See, Annabeth? They didn't do anything."

I rolled my eyes. "Oh, right. Then, tell me, who did it?"

Dad shrugged. "Maybe you did it unconsciously. You're not exactly aware of what you do when you're working on this, right?"

The way Dad said it made me feel… hurt. "You're practically calling me a freak, Dad."

"Annabeth…" Dad said. He sighed and crouched down to my height—I hated it when adults did that!—, putting a hand on my shoulder. "You know what I mean, Annabeth."

I shrugged his hand away. "Whatever." I glared at the twins. "I want my pages back, you little devils." As I exited the room, I turned back to look at my so-called family. That's when everything clicked in my mind. As I watched Jane comfort her _poor little babies_, assuring them that _she'd make sure their sister didn't hurt them_, I saw it.

A handful of torn paper stuck out of Jane's back pocket.

That very same night, I made a decision. Clearly, Jane didn't want me around. I was too much of a threat to her precious boys. Dad clearly had forgotten all about my mom—I was just the remainder or his biggest mistake ever. He didn't even talk about her to me.

_It would upset Jane_, I mused while fixing up my backpack. _Everything seems to revolve around Jane, doesn't it?_

Those thoughts plagued me. Haunted me. I actually had nightmares about that stuff.

I made a decision that night, one I never really regretted. Even to this day, I don't fully regret it. I wrote a note (after a rather long mental debate on whether I should even bother), stocked up in the kitchen, took a hammer from Dad's tool box just in case, fixed my hair up in a ponytail, and filled my backpack with a few books, pens, my notebook, and a few other key necessities.

I hesitated only once before I left. I thought about the good times I'd had in this house. Few as they were, I'd still be leaving those behind. For good. I looked down at the note that rested atop my bed, my gaze landing on a single line I'd written: _I think we'll all feel better like this_.

And that sort of made my mind up for me. I'd find better moments to replace the good ones. I just knew it. So with that mindset, I jumped out my window in the dead of the night, ran down the street, and never looked back.

* * *

**AN:**

**And so it begins! Chapter two will be up next Tuesday. Also, thank-you to those who reviewed the last chapter! **

**Small note: These chapters are long. Excessively so, sometimes. And they're sorta bulky, because I have a style that tends to lack dialogue :/ So, to make the reading less… tiring, I guess, I'd suggest rationing the chapters out instead of trying to read it in one go. Suit yourself, though!**

**Thanks for reading! Review?**

**-DemiSpy.**

* * *

**Review Replies for Anonymous Reviewers/People with PMing disabled:**

**blankslate37: **Thank-you! I hope you liked this chapter just as much :) This one will be _very _different, but I think much better too. I'll wait and see what you think, then.


	3. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything Rick Riordan owns, nor do I own anything you may recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

* * *

** Chapter Two**

* * *

I was seven years old when I ran away from home. You can't blame me for not having a clearly drawn out plan.

I spent a week or so wandering the streets. Apollo helped me. He never tried to talk me into going back home—I'm positive he blamed himself for my decision to run away; partially, at least. I didn't blame him. I blamed Jane, and I blamed my Dad.

The twins, too. But I knew that it was Jane and Dad's fault they were such nitwits, anyway. They raised them like that.

My mother was the one that told me to go home. I saw her twice in my dreams; she told me the same thing both times: it's dangerous out there. You were safe with your father. Go home.

Safe or not, I was sick and tired of living with my Dad. I didn't know if I loved him the way a daughter is supposed to love her father—I didn't know if he loved me the way he was supposed to love a daughter. I told this to my mother in the second dream. She didn't say anything after that.

Apollo told me that she and him had an argument of sorts on where I should go. Apollo had suggested I go to Olympus, which my mother blatantly refused. I understood, in a way. I couldn't live on Olympus—it wouldn't be right. It stung, though, how my mother didn't want me, either. Maybe it's an exaggeration, but that's how I felt. Rejected. My Dad didn't want me, Jane didn't want me, my Mother didn't want me… it was too much for a kid.

There was another place I could go. Apollo called it Camp Half-Blood; he said it was a place for demigods like me. Personally, I didn't know if it was a good idea or not. A recurring doubt haunted my mind—what if I wasn't wanted there, either? Then I'd definitely have nowhere to go.

I didn't belong anywhere.

Apollo sort of respected my opinion, though he pestered me about this camp for a few days. Once he got that I meant it when I said no, we agreed on maybe. Until we figured something else out, he helped me continue going… wherever I was going.

I walked a lot. Monsters attacked me. Sometimes I took buses. I slept in these buses, and sometimes out in woods and forests. It was a whole new kind of lifestyle, but I came to like it, to an extent. I felt free.

I didn't miss my dad; something I think dismayed my mother. She was probably waiting for me to admit my mistake and beg to go home. But no. I really, truly didn't want to go back. So I didn't.

I had no idea where I was going. I just wanted to get away from my home, from Jane and my Dad, and from my life in general. The furthest I got was New York—which, you have to admit, is pretty far a distance from Virginia, considering I was a child traveling on her own (with the assistance of the sun god… details, details).

That was where things got kind of interesting.

I believe it was my second—possibly third—week on the run, I can't quite recall. I was in downtown Manhattan, blending in with the crowds. I absolutely loved New York for this: no matter how odd it was to see a seven-year-old kid walking down the streets on her own with a heavy backpack slung over her back, reading a book that seemed to be written in Ancient Greek… no one bothered to look twice.

Eventually, I ended up in a park. I sat down on a bench with my book, took out an apple from my backpack, and settled down to read. Careless as I sound, that's how I felt. I was at peace. My dad and stepmother weren't nagging at me, my stepbrother's cries were only a memory, and no matter how many monsters attacked me, I never got scolded for "putting the family in danger".

No matter how strange my current living conditions were, in my naïve seven-year-old mind, life was good.

There was a school bus parked at the park entrance. The inscription on the side was a pretty nasty paint job, if I do say so myself, what with its bright red color contrasting terribly with the yellow in the background. In my dyslexic mind, I easily pictured the inscription reading McDonald's or something.

The school bus isn't important just yet, though. No, what's important in this part of my story is the black-haired kid who had the nerve to walk up to me and say hi.

"Hi."

See? No joke.

I looked up at the kid, and my gaze was met with a pair of curious green eyes. The kid looked about my age, and was staring at my book. "Hi," I said , wondering what he wanted.

He seemed to take my greeting as a gesture of friendship or something, seeing as he sat down next to me. "What are you reading?" he asked.

I looked at him for a moment, trying to decide on either telling him off, or answering his question. Maybe it was the calm demeanor I'd taken up that day, or maybe my personality was going soft now that I lived so… so carefree, as I'd put it earlier. Point is I found myself answering his question. "It's about architecture," I said simply. "Greek."

The boy nodded. "That's why it has funny letters?"

Funny letters? I thought. "I guess… that's the Greek alphabet."

He nodded again, staring at the book a moment longer before speaking up. "I'm Percy," he said suddenly, sticking out a hand for me to shake. "What's your name?"

I stared at his hand with my brow furrowed. What did this stranger want with me, anyway? He seemed harmless, that was for sure, perhaps a bit too straightforward… but then again, he was a kid, like me, at the time. Kids are always blunt and straightforward.

However, my seven-year-old self didn't quite process that thought, and I actually got a little freaked out. "What do you want?" I asked, the words coming out a bit too harsh.

Percy retracted his hand. "What do you mean?"

"Why are you talking to me? Where's your mom? I doubt she'd want you talking to strangers."

Percy shook his head. "My mom's not here right now—and you're right. She wouldn't want me talking to strangers, which is why I asked for your name. And I'm talking to you because your book looked kind of weird because of the funny letters, so I came to ask about it."

I nodded slowly. "So you asked about the book… why haven't you left?"

He shrugged. "I'm here on a school trip. I don't have much to do, and you look like a nice person, so I'm talking to you."

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how I met Percy Jackson.

After a few more questions and answers from both of us, a few eye-rolls from me, and some odd looks from him, I got to know this kid fairly well. Which, believe it or not, was sort of a problem.

The thing here is he got to know me, too. Something about Percy made me trust him. Considering the fact that Apollo had yet to show up in my mind and tell me to watch out for what I said, I decided to launch into my story on how I ran away from home. Naturally, I didn't tell him about being a demigod, or my curse, or my mother, or Apollo… you get the picture.

Still, I think I told him a little too much.

"So you just ran away? Just like that?"

"Yep," I said, popping the 'p'. "And I don't regret it one bit."

"But how do you sleep? Or eat?" He furrowed his brow. "You don't… steal… do you?"

I shook my head, and laughed. "No, I don't. It's… complicated, I guess, but I can honestly say I haven't done anything against the law."

He nodded. "What are you going to do, then? Where are you going?"

I bit my lip. "I don't know. Wherever life takes me, I guess." I'd once heard someone say that last line in a movie or something. I thought it fit nicely with my situation.

Percy didn't seem very satisfied with my answer, though. His expression turned to one of concentration, which I found rather funny. His nose scrunched up ever so slightly, his lips pressed into a thin line, his eyes looked straight forward, and his brow furrowed. On a seven-year-old face, the expression was rather comical.

Eventually, he broke out of his trance. "I know!" he said. His tone was cheery, and the smile that lit up his face was contagious enough to make me smile too. "You can come to my school! It's a boarding school, so you can actually live there and stuff."

The smile slid off my face. "What?"

"Yeah!" Percy said, still on cloud nine. "Think about it: you can learn stuff, which you told me you like to do, because it's a school. You get a place to sleep in and food, and you can see me every day because we're both in first grade! It's a great idea!"

I almost felt bad about breaking his bubble, but it wasn't like I could go on with such a ridiculous idea. I shook my head. "What about tuition? I don't have enough money to pay for a spot in a boarding school!"

Percy's expression turned slightly downcast before lighting up again. "Let's ask Mrs. Warren!"

My eyes widened. "A teacher? No!"

Percy gave me an odd look. "Why not?"

I shook my head. "If you tell her I ran away from home, she'll turn me in to the police! And then I'll have to go back with my dad and Jane!"

"Then I won't tell her you ran away from home," Percy said, as if it were the most logical thing in the world.

I wanted to bang my head against my book—and let me tell you: it was quite a large book. "Then what do you expect me to tell them, Percy? If I don't tell them that I ran away, I'm going to have to lie and—" I stopped in my tracks, an idea forming in my head. A smile slowly lit my face. "Percy! That's brilliant!"

He looked at me, confused. "It is?"

"Yes!" I grinned wider. "All I have to do is tell a little white lie, and… it's perfect!"

Thinking back on it, my idea wasn't all that grand—but it certainly was for a seven-year-old. Being a daughter of Athena was most certainly paying off at the moment, though by the nature of my plan, one would've thought I'm a daughter of Hermes. But I digress.

I looked at Percy, who was still trying to figure out what I meant. I sighed. "Okay, Percy. Here's the plan…"

* * *

"And you can't remember anything? At all?"

Mrs. Warren was a woman in her mid-thirties. She was a nice, patient woman, the sort that's clearly meant for her job as a teacher. She had warm brown eyes that, at the moment, were looking at me with traces of pity, compassion, and some other heartwarming emotions I'd rarely seen directed to me in my seven years of life.

I felt bad about lying to such a nice person, but there was no way whatsoever I was telling her the truth. "No, ma'am," I said in a small voice. "I woke up earlier today on that bench with this backpack, and my only memory was my name. Annabeth." I paused. "Well, I think that's my name."

Oh, I'm good at this, I thought.

"Is there anything in the backpack that might clue you in to who you are? Where your home is? Your parents?"

I tried hard not to recoil at the word parents. "No, ma'am. I already went through it—it's all I've done today. I did remember a few things as I went, like today's date, and a few other things." I paused again, and dampened my expression a bit. "It's so strange. I'm… I'm so scared."

Mrs. Warren gave me a small smile. "You can come with us for now. I should contact the authorities, ask around if someone has reported you missing—"

"No!" I said, perhaps a bit too emphatically. "No. I… I can't. I don't want the authorities to get involved. Not until I remember more. Until I figure something out."

Mrs. Warren pursed her lips, and hesitated for a while. "I suppose…" she sighed, and then nodded. "I suppose it's best for you to try and remember something before we take any official action." She turned to look at Percy, who had been quietly standing beside me, watching us. "Keep an eye on her, alright? She's coming with us to school. I…" she squeezed her eyes shut, probably wondering how to put her next few words lightly. "I'm going to speak to the headmaster about keeping Annabeth with us for some time."

Percy nodded. I didn't like how she told him to "keep an eye on me", as if I needed to be watched over. Please.

"Thank you, ma'am," I said.

Mrs. Warren nodded and gestured for us to leave, still biting her lip as she pulled out her cell phone.

I had a feeling the headmaster wouldn't like me very much.

It doesn't matter, I thought. I can't stay for long.

And it was true. I could only stay there for so long before they decided to contact the authorities, and then I was done for. No. I had to think of a better plan, and leave before they turned me in. How I'd do that, I still didn't know.

But I was a daughter of Athena, I told myself, and a daughter of Athena always has a plan.

The bus ride was loud. Very loud.

Percy explained that his school mostly received kids with certain disabilities. He had ADHD and dyslexia, something that made my eyes go as wide as dining plates. Figuratively speaking, of course.

Of course, his eyes turned a similar size when I told him that so did I. I made him promise not to tell the teachers—it'd be kind of odd for me to remember that. I told him I'd "find out" sooner or later. He agreed, though I know he felt kind of bad about lying.

The look on his face made me feel kind of bad about it, too.

We changed the topic while on the ride, and he told me about the school, the teachers, the classes, etc. Since most of the kids had ADHD or similar conditions, the classes were supposed to be fun and interactive. I liked the sound of that.

Percy's school, Manhattan Private Elementary School (brilliant name, I know), was located about an hour and a half away from the park. It stood on the outskirts of the city, on the highway. Woods surrounded it, and not another form of civilization could be seen for a couple miles.

Although the building was, in my opinion, quite nice, it gave off a subtly creepy aura. Percy said it was only a matter of time before I got used to it. I supposed he was right.

When everyone headed inside, Mrs. Warren pulled me apart from the group. "The headmaster would like to meet you," she said. She looked nervous.

I nodded, waved goodbye to Percy, and walked down some hallway at Mrs. Warren's side. We arrived at a door labeled "Headmaster Sanders". Mrs. Warren told me to wait outside for a moment, leaving me to my thoughts.

I didn't like Mrs. Warren's expression. I knew that she was somewhat scared of the Headmaster. Moreover, I knew that this couldn't mean anything good.

I had to convince them to take me in. Just for a little bit, until I figured out a better plan. And so, in my opinion, drastic times called for drastic measures. Praying to Apollo that my idea would work, I willed my necklace to become visible. Then, I took it off and stowed it in my pocket as the door creaked open and Mrs. Warren beckoned me to go inside.

The Headmaster's office was neither big nor small. It just was an office. Modestly furnished and well-lit, it gave off a rather warm aura.

The expression on Headmaster Sanders's face, however, didn't. "You must be Annabeth," he said.

I nodded.

"Please, sit."

I sat on one of the chairs in front of his desk, and Mrs. Warren sat beside me. Headmaster Sanders then placed his clasped hands on the desk, and he looked at me closely. "Mrs. Warren says one of my students found you today at the park, while the class was on a field trip. Am I correct?"

Again, I nodded.

"You claim to have amnesia," he continued. "And have no recollection of your life before this morning. You can remember the basic things any other human being your age would know, but cannot recall any personal information. Am I correct?

And… yeah. I nodded. Techinically speaking, I can speak without my necklace on, no harm done. But I prefer to prevent, considering how taking my necklace off usually launches me straight into my fits. How weird would it be to greet the Headmaster with my zombie face?

Headmaster Sanders seemed to be getting annoyed with me. "You don't want to contact the authorities. Surely, you must know that, if you did, you would receive help immediately towards returning you to wherever you… came from. Also, you would undoubtedly receive medical help for your memory loss."

There goes another nod.

I could feel Mrs. Warren tense beside me as Headmaster Sanders's expression fully became annoyed. "Then why, Annabeth, do you not want to contact the authorities?"

I took a deep breath. If this didn't work, I'd be doomed. "I'm scared," I said, making sure to control my tone. "I don't know anything about myself. Please don't contact the authorities. Please let me stay here as a regular student until my memory returns. Until I figure something out."

Mrs. Warren and Headmaster Sanders looked dazed. Very, very dazed, and very, very out of it. Their eyes looked kind of glassy. I waited, very still in my seat, for them to return to their senses. It took a few moments, but their expressions cleared up eventually.

"You can stay," Headmaster Sanders said, in a monotone voice that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up straight. "You will stay as a student. I will not contact the authorities."

"Yes," Mrs. Warren said in the same tone. "You can stay until your memory returns. Until you figure something out."

Both Mrs. Warren and Headmaster Sanders shook their heads quickly, for a fraction of a second, as if they had some sort of nervous tic. Then, Headmaster Sanders spoke again, this time in his normal, sergeant-like voice. "Alright, Annabeth. You can stay here for some time until your memory returns. After that, however, I will contact the authorities. I cannot have a runaway child in my school for long without having eyebrows rising. I do not want to answer a single question. Am I clear?"

I nodded vigorously, making sure to stay quiet and not point out that he'd said more or less the same thing only seconds ago, in a zombie-like voice.

Mrs. Warren looked somewhat shocked, but made no comment. Instead, she stood up and told Headmaster Sanders: "I will assign Annabeth to one of the girls' dorms, then. We have several unoccupied rooms, though I would like for her to share with someone, in order to monitor her. Amnesia can have some side effects, and I would not like to take a risk."

The Headmaster nodded. "Give her some school supplies. She will be attending classes with your group." He paused, and turned to look at me. "You are in first grade, right?"

I nodded.

"Good." He turned back to Mrs. Warren. "Look for some clothes and toiletries for her, as well. Anything she might need. I'm sure we have something." He then furrowed his brow and blinked, as if he couldn't believe he'd just said that.

Mrs. Warren seemed to be thinking the same thing. "Yes… o-of course. Good evening, then, Headmaster. Come, Annabeth."

I nodded one last time at Headmaster Sanders, who was hardly paying me any attention, and followed Mrs. Warren outside.

Taking advantage of her distracted state, I stood close behind her, out of her range of sight, and slipped my necklace back on, willing it to disappear. Better safe than sorry, I told myself.

"I don't know what just happened," Mrs. Warren said, still walking down the hall with me at her side, "but let me tell you something: you're lucky."

No, I thought. I'm cursed.

* * *

Mrs. Warren left me to meet my new roommate while she looked for some clothes. She said the drama room might have some things I could borrow until we figured something else out.

My roommate introduced herself as Leanne. She was a petite girl, quite short for our age, with blonde hair much darker than mine, almost a sort of hazel color. Her large brown eyes were surrounded by a splatter of freckles all over her nose and cheekbones.

Oh, and she was quiet. Very, very quiet. When Mrs. Warren introduced us, Leanne said a total of three words to me: "Hi, I'm Leanne."

And… yeah. That's essentially all she said that night.

I set my backpack next to my bed, and snuggled into the sheets. Exhaustion slowly caught up with me, and I let it take over. With a final glance around the room, a thought crossed my mind: This is it. A new home.

The thought comforted me more than I expected it to. Satisfied, I curled into a ball under the covers, and fell asleep.

* * *

**AN:**

**So we've met Percy! And Leanne! **

**Thanks for reading (and, to those who reviewed, for reviewing)! Sorry about the delay-this was supposed to be up yesterday.**

**See you next week! Review?**

**-DemiSpy**

* * *

**Review Replies for Anonymous Reviewers/People with PMing disabled:**

**darkness**: Thanks! :D


	4. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything Rick Riordan owns, nor do I own anything you may recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

* * *

**Chapter Three**

* * *

When I woke up, I noticed there was a box beside my bed, with a note.

Besides the fact that I'm dyslexic, let me tell you that Leanne's scrawl wasn't very legible. Better than the average kid's our age, sure. But still quite a toughie to decipher. Fifteen minutes later, I finally figured out the message, despite the grammar and spelling mistakes that seemed to jump out at my confused eyes.

_Mrs. Warren left this for you last night. You don't have any classes today. –Leanne._

Yes. Believe it or not, I took fifteen minutes to decipher fifteen words.

After I finished reading the note, my stomach growled. The day before I'd only eaten my apple for lunch, and had skipped dinner due to exhaustion. I was seven years old! A growing kid!

I vaguely remembered seeing a vending machine out in the hall last night. Taking a five dollar bill out of my backpack, and noticing I only had twenty bucks left of the money Apollo had given me, I walked out the door and into my hunt for a snack.

Five minutes later, I returned to my room with a pack of cookies in my hand. Not so healthy, but hey. Let me get this straight: I was a _kid_.

I decided to have a look through the box Mrs. Warren had supposedly left for me. I found a pair of jeans, some shorts, and two T-Shirts. Mrs. Warren didn't have the best taste in the world, but who was I to judge? I'd spent the past few weeks rotating the same three shirts and two pairs of jeans.

I found another note inside the box, this time in nice and round handwriting. It was easier to read, but the note was longer than Leanne's. Much longer. I sat on the floor, sighing impatiently, reading the note. In short, Mrs. Warren used a lot of words to tell me she'd take me shopping in the afternoon, and that I could go to the cafeteria to eat breakfast.

Believe it or not, the breakfast thing excited me a lot more than shopping did.

I stood up and once again left my room. The cafeteria was, thankfully, just where I remembered it. The lunch lady was nice enough, and she gave me some milk and pancakes. I loved pancakes.

While I was eating at a table by the corner of the room, immersed in my own thoughts, I heard footsteps. I looked up. "Mrs. Warren?"

"Oh, good," she said, walking over to me. "You're awake." She took a seat in front of me. "Listen, I have permission from the Headmaster to take you out shopping. First we're going to get you some clothes and then school supplies. You can start classes tomorrow, in my group. Leanne and Percy are in my group as well, so they'll be in charge of updating you, alright?"

I nodded.

"Great! Now, there's something I've been meaning to tell you." She paused, fiddling with a strand of her hair. "See, this school is for special kids with health issues. _Mental_ health issues, for the most part."

She waited for a reaction, but I just stayed quiet and nodded.

"Some of these kids," she continued, "have personality disorders, memory problems, et cetera. For example, both Percy and Leanne have ADHD—Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. Do you get what I mean?"

I nodded, suddenly recalling my mental note from earlier. "My memory problem fits nicely, then. I'm dyslexic, too."

Mrs. Warren's eyebrows rose. "Really? Did you remember that?"

I shook my head. "I took ages to read your note. And the word _dyslexia _just popped into my head. But that's what dyslexia is, right? Having trouble reading stuff."

"In essence, yes. That's a curious coincidence—Percy is also dyslexic," Mrs. Warren mused. "In that case, I suppose you'll fit in just fine here. I was worried that the other kids would feel strange around you. It's funny, but I hadn't even thought of your memory issue." She sighed, laughing, and shook her head. "I'm sorry, Annabeth. My head is kind of jumbled up since last night."

_Um, sorry? _I thought. "That's alright."

"Anyways," she said. "Finish eating. Classes will be out in a minute—my group is at P.E. right now, so I have this last period free. We can leave in a few minutes, just let me go get some things, alright? I'll meet you at the main entrance."

I nodded, suddenly noticing the bags under her eyes. Trying not to wince, I made a mental note to ask Apollo about this… what did he call it? Charmspeaking, I think it was. Something about Aphrodite copying it off him.

Mrs. Warren left the cafeteria, leaving me to my thoughts.

So think I did.

* * *

Leanne's eyebrows rose, peeking out from the book she was buried in. "That's a lot."

I rolled my eyes, hauling the shopping bags through the door. "Mrs. Warren had some 'urgent business to tend to' and I got to haul them through the door. At least she helped taking them upstairs."

Leanne shrugged. She stood up from her bed, walked over to me, and took two of the bags from my hands. "They're not all that heavy."

I shook my head. "The store only had huge bags like these. I don't know why. And they gave me a lot of them, too. This would've all fit in only one bag."

Leanne peeked around through the bags. "Maybe two. What did you get?"

I scrunched up my nose. "Clothes."

Leanne giggled quietly. "Some girl you are."

"I like books better," I said, setting down the other two bags next to my bed. "Ah," I said, stretching out my arms. "That feels nice."

Leanne climbed back onto her bed, book in her hands. She immersed herself once more into her book, and so our conversation was over.

I watched her for a moment. I wished I could stay still as long as her.

Hey, wait a minute. "Leanne?" She turned to look at me. "Mrs. Warren said you have ADHD."

Leanne nodded. "Yeah. What about it?"

"How do you stay still so long?"

Leanne took a minute to respond. "I can't. It's really, really hard."

I sat down on my bed, facing her. "Huh?"

Leanne shrugged. "I actually _want_ to be normal, okay? I… I don't like being like this." She looked like she was about to say something else, but she cut herself off and turned back to her book.

For some reason, though, my own ADHD didn't want to let go of the subject just yet. "I don't get it."

Leanne sighed. She looked annoyed. "Look. My mom sent me to this school, saying she didn't want to see me again until I was a _proper _child. Okay?"

I was taken aback. Why did this sound so familiar? "What about your dad?"

Leanne's anger seemed to melt away. She looked sad. "Never knew him," she said quietly. "Mom misses him a lot. That's why she's all… weird."

I nodded. "I'm sorry," I said.

Leanne rolled her eyes. "Everyone is."

"No, really," I said, knowing full-well how annoying pity can be. "I… I can't explain to you, okay? But I get it. I really, really do get it. And… I'm sorry. I shouldn't have asked."

"Whatever," she shrugged.

I swallowed hard and decided to leave it at that. I obviously couldn't tell her that my dad didn't want me around, much less did my stepmother, because I wasn't supposed to remember that. I couldn't tell her my own family considered me a freak. And I certainly couldn't tell her that, in some sort of twisted way, I kind of was a freak.

Ah, the life of a demigod.

Speaking of which… I hadn't had a proper fit in a long time. And I could _feel_ it. Literally. All that magic buildup was almost choking me—in fact, I'm pretty sure my necklace had tightened a little bit around my throat.

Huh. That was a pretty neat alert system, Apollo. Smart.

_Why, thank-you._

I jerked upwards. _Did you seriously just invade my head?_

No answer. I really shouldn't have expected one, anyway. Looking through my backpack, I took out my fits notebook and a pen. Now, the million-dollar question: where, oh where can I go?

The bathroom wasn't an option. Leanne would probably notice. If I started singing, I'd be in a tight spot. And even if I didn't… well, I decided safety first.

Of course, safety first involved asking Leanne. I bit my lip, and turned to face her. She was completely absorbed in her book. I didn't want to break her concentration.

Deciding to roam around the halls a little bit first—who knew? Maybe I'd find some empty and abandoned closet or something—, I stood up and walked to the door. Just as I placed my hand on the knob, Leanne said from behind me: "Where are you going?"

I turned to face her, and shrugged. "I'm going to look for a place to think."

"Think," Leanne repeated. "With a pen and notebook?"

I nodded. "Yep."

Leanne stared at me. "There's an empty room at the end of the hall," she said. She turned back to her book. "Teachers used to stay there at night, making sure we didn't break curfew. They haven't used it in a while. We've got security cameras and stuff now."

I nodded, and gave her a small smile even though she couldn't see it. "Thanks."

She nodded, and I saw the corners of her lips turn upwards.

I walked outside and shut the door behind me. Things seemed to be looking up for me.

* * *

The next day, things definitely looked up.

For one thing, Leanne and I got along a lot better. She apologized for being rude to me the other night, and I apologized again for being pushy on the topic. And so we started anew.

What really brought us together was our love of books. I told Leanne I was dyslexic, and she resolved the matter by reading to me. Leanne loved adventure stories—I liked her books just fine, but I missed my Greek books from back at home—and she read to me from those. We had a great time; we would laugh, gasp, cry, and shriek together throughout the story, making funny comments and acting out our favorite parts.

Yeah. Good times.

Then there was Percy. Being the great friend he was turning out to be, he groaned along with me when I told him about my shopping adventures with Mrs. Warren. Between him and Leanne, I received the grand tour of the school that afternoon after classes were out. Although Percy and Leanne weren't much more than acquaintances at first, we all kind of bonded in that awesome way kids in first grade tend to do.

I'm not all that proud to say that I made myself a reputation in record time: ten minutes after math class had begun, I was officially deemed the class nerd. Jenny Roberts, whom I kicked off that throne, seemed to have resolved to glare at me for the rest of her existence. I didn't pay her much attention, but by the end of the day she was starting to freak me out.

The sort-of bad thing that resulted from this was becoming a tutor. Percy and Leanne proclaimed me their math tutor, which brings me to _the situation_…

"No! We should go over the shapes!"

Leanne rolled her eyes. "Percy! We saw that topic _last _week! I vote we practice the two-digit sums! That's _today's _homework!"

"But Mrs. Warren is going to quiz us on shapes this week!"

"And she'll quiz us on the sums _next week_!"

"Exactly!"

"Exactly!"

Getting them to agree on one topic was going to be a _little _more complicated than I had expected. Just saying.

"Guys," I said loudly, trying to hear my own voice over their bickering. Nope, nothing. "Umm… you guys…." Nothing. "_Guys_!"

They turned to look at me. "Yeah?"

I stared at them. "Don't talk at the same time like that. It's creepy," I said. "Anyway. Percy, you sit on my bed. Leanne, sit on your bed. I'm going to sit in the space in between them, on the floor, and answer both your questions on _both _topics as we go. Okay?"

Good thinking, me.

They looked at each other, then back at me, and shrugged. Standing up, both of them went to sit on their designated spots, diligently setting their things in front of them, in a position where they could face me.

Proud of my quick thinking, I went to sit in my spot on the floor. Shaking my head and deciding that spot wasn't comfortable at all, I stood up and took my pillow. I set it on the floor, and then sat on it with a loud _thump._

Ah. Much better.

I turned to look up at them. "Alright. Leanne, you start on your homework. If you get stumped, you ask. Percy, take out the shapes chart Mrs. Warren handed out—yes, that one—and study it. I'm going to quiz you in a minute."

They nodded, and turned to their work. Smiling to myself, I picked up the book I'd left on the floor earlier, and began to leaf through it. I relished in the quiet, hearing only Leanne's pencil and Percy's fingers drumming on the bedspread…

"I'm _stumped_!"

I jumped about twenty feet into the air as I heard both their voices bring me out of my peaceful state.

_Okay, _I thought, looking up at my two pupils, which had taken to glaring at each other, and fighting over who got me first. _This wasn't such a good idea._

And it really, really wasn't. Or so I discovered five minutes later, when Percy and Leanne's _I-get-Annabeth-first _verbal contest turned into a…

"PILLOW FIGHT!"

I'm not sure who called it out, but I'll tell you this: We never tried the tutoring thing again after that. Pillow fights were much more fun.

* * *

That night, I dreamt of my mother and Apollo. They were standing at each other's sides; my mother had her arms crossed, her gaze fixed on me intently, while Apollo waved enthusiastically.

_"Don't get too comfortable there, Annabeth," my mother said. "Remember: you can only stay for so long." She sighed. "It's a good place, I suppose. You'll be safe there for now. But please be careful."_

_I nodded. "I will. I'll think something else up."_

_My mother nodded. "I am not pleased with the way you convinced these people to take you in, Annabeth. It is not correct to manipulate others' minds. It was necessary, which is why I will… how to put it? Let this slide. But be careful with your gifts, Annabeth. Use them wisely."_

_Then, with a snap of her fingers, she vanished._

_ Apollo just rolled his eyes. "Such a drama queen." He then grinned up at me, and waved one last time. "Have fun, kiddo!" Then, in the same manner my mother had vanished, he was gone._

* * *

**AN:**

**So, chapter three! This is cute, I think. And it gets the plot moving, so I like it. Not fillery at all.**

**Thank-you to those who reviewed—it means a lot. A lot lot lot. To all my other readers (because I actually ****_know_**** there are other people reading this), thanks for reading! Was this chapter good enough to merit a review? No? Darn. Better luck next time :P**

**Thanks for reading, everyone! Have a nice week!**

**See ya on Tuesday,**

**-DemiSpy.**

* * *

**Review Replies for Anonymous Reviewers/People with PMing disabled:**

**Guest: **I hope you liked it! Thanks for reviewing!


	5. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything Rick Riordan owns, nor do I own anything you may recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

* * *

**Chapter Four**

* * *

**Chapter Four**

By the time my third week at school rolled around, a ton of things were happening.

My largest worry loomed over me: A few days back, Mrs. Warren asked me if I felt comfortable enough with my memory to go to the authorities. Truth to be told, I'd sort of forgotten about all that. Everything felt so normal. Everything was so perfect.

I had a relatively stable home, a pair of awesome friends, and I had this sort of peaceful existence where no one judged me, no one expected anything of me… and yet I had a set deadline, knowing I couldn't stay forever.

It hit me hard, you could say. Because I knew I would have to leave soon. And I just didn't want to.

Moving on, though. Something else that bugged me were my fits. They'd turned more intense as of late. When I asked Apollo, he made some really bad joke about puberty. Err, hello? I was _seven _years old…

I didn't get much of a response from him. Leanne still found my little nighttime escapades a little weird, but had long since stopped asking. And I really appreciated that, because I hated lying to her.

Lastly, I'd seen a couple ads and stuff on TV. I couldn't be absolutely, one-hundred percent sure, but I think my dad was looking for me. And I just didn't know what to think about that. Mother hadn't said anything to me—in fact, the last time I dreamt of her was when I had first arrived at school. And Apollo didn't comment on my dad at all.

That was good, I suppose.

Other than that stuff, though, things were going great. Percy, Leanne, and I had a lot of fun together, and I'd grown attached to them. Too attached, even. I didn't like the feeling of depending on others—it'd never worked out for me in the past—but being with them made me feel comfortable. Relaxed.

I absolutely loved that feeling. Even demigod paranoia couldn't outsmart it.

The day when things took an interesting turn was a sunny one. Us first-graders had a field trip scheduled; we were visiting a science museum. My excitement could only be surpassed by Leanne's, who loved science. As for Percy… well, he was kind of jittery.

He didn't like museums. Or big public places, for that matter.

"The day we picked you up," he explained to me, "we were on a field trip. And I had some sort of accident. I don't know what happened, really. But, apparently, some water fountain blew up and the janitor decided to take it out on me."

I rolled my eyes, walking behind Melanie Sanders as we made a beeline for the entrance. "Some janitor."

He nodded. "The really funny thing was that the janitor's hands were kind of… I dunno, crumbly or something. It looked as if scales or something covered his hands, not skin." Percy made a face. "He was probably really, really old."

Leanne laughed. "Or you probably need to get your eyes checked."

"Or that," Percy conceded. He looked around. "This place is huge," he muttered.

I nodded. "Great place to get lost in," I said. "Don't do anything stupid, Percy."

He just laughed, knowing his getting lost was quite the possibility. "Right-o."

I looked around. The main room of the museum was round, and had a bunch of arched doors that led to other rooms. A grand staircase directly in front of me led to the second floor, and another beyond that one led to the third floor. The ceiling was high, and the top of it gave the impression that you were looking at outer space.

I liked that place from the start.

"Attention, students," Mrs. Warren called out from a few feet away from us. "I'm going to hand out a worksheet—you can all work in teams of three to five students, okay? As we go through each room, I want you to answer it. Melanie will help me pass out pencils to everyone."

Leanne received the worksheet and pencil for the three of us, and skimmed over it. "It's only ten questions," she said. "They sound easy enough… I think."

I laughed. "Let's get to work, then. I think we're going to the animal exhibit first."

* * *

In my opinion, the three of us made an awesome team.

Leanne read exhibit signs for us. Since both Percy and I were dyslexic, it was best to leave that task to Leanne. And since the three of us were ADHD, we goofed around a little to keep from blowing up in such an orderly place.

I was in charge of finding the worksheet answers in the information Leanne read. Leanne would jot them down for me, too. She had the nicest handwriting out of the three of us.

As for Percy… well, he made some great company. And his observations on the exhibits were pretty fun, too.

"Are you sure," he asked me _again_, "like, really, really sure, that that thing is _not _an old man doing a handstand?"

I looked at the image of the ameba for the umpteenth time. "Percy, how on earth would that look like an old man doing a handstand? It's a germ!"

Percy studied the image closely, scratching his chin. "That's what they want us to think."

I stared at him, trying to figure out if he was actually serious, and then laughed. He was. "C'mon, we have one more exhibit to go. And Leanne wandered off somewhere, so we need to find her before the group leaves."

Percy nodded. "Just know that, this time, I don't care how smart you are, Annabeth. I still think it's an old man doing a handstand."

* * *

During the rest of the time we were in the museum, during the bus ride, and as we entered the school, I felt observed. That uncomfortable feeling you get in the back of neck when someone's staring.

Leanne and Percy noticed my ever-so-slightly jumpy nerves. When they asked about it, I told them not to worry, that I just had some things on my mind. They didn't buy it, of course. But at least they didn't ask me anything else.

During the last three weeks, I'd let myself relax. Too much. Demigod paranoia was starting to kick in again, and suddenly I felt really scared. I hadn't been attacked in weeks. I hadn't felt as if I were in danger for a long time.

And now, getting those feelings back was pretty overwhelming.

In the end, it all culminated on the night's fit. I bid Leanne goodnight, slipped out of the dorm, and went to the empty room at the end of the hall, walking along the walls to make sure the camera in the corner didn't notice me. Normal.

After I opened the door, discreetly, quietly locking it behind me, I got a bit of a surprise.

Thankfully, I was smart enough not to scream. Air left my mouth at record speed, but I emitted no sound.

I was face to face with two empousai. Surrounding them, I noticed out of the corner of my eye, were three telekhines. What they were doing _here _of all places, I couldn't understand. They all stared at me intently, studying me from the tips of my toes to the last hair on my head. I stood still—so, so still—praying to my mother and Apollo and every other deity I knew for this to be a hallucination of some sort.

When one of the empousai lunged at me and tore a gash on my left arm as I dove sideways, I realized I was certainly not hallucinating.

Clearly, the empousai that tore through my skin was the leader of sorts. The rest of the monsters took her attack as the signal to attack, too. May I remind you I was unarmed?

I literally bounced off the walls for the next minute or so. I evaded the monsters, jumping out of the way in time for them to bump into one of the few chairs in the room, or the (rather sharp) abandoned glass coffee table at the edge of the room.

Even if the monsters didn't disappear, they did end up a little dazed.

I felt surges of adrenaline, the type I hadn't experienced since I ran away from home. _This is my life_, I suddenly realized. That comfortable little bubble I'd been living in for the last couple of months wasn't me. Hiding away under a rather stupid cover story and lying for my own sake wasn't me, either. Fending for my life, recognizing I was a demigod… that was me.

Although recognizing all that made me feel kind of proud of myself, it didn't help my current situation at all. Cursing under my breath (in Greek) as I noticed some of the hall's lights were coming on, I suddenly realized just about how desperate my situation had become.

Looking around the room (and barely dodging an empousai's claws while at it), I noticed my one escape route. The window. I was on the second floor—the impact couldn't hurt _that _much. Right?

I heard footsteps and a couple voices approaching. As much as I needed an extra hand at this, I knew mortals wouldn't be any help at all. Biting my lip, and glancing one last time at the door (and dropping to the ground as two telekhines lunged at me from either direction), I ran towards the window, slid it open, and jumped out in a matter of seconds.

I landed with a soft thud, rolling onto the ground as I bent my knees. Okay, _ow_. That really, really hurt.

The monsters jumped out right after me, so I ran straight into the woods behind the school. In that moment, my necklace became visible and shined a little, leaving me seeing stars. Still running, I looked down at my necklace. There was a charm on it, I noticed, shaped in the form of a little red star.

_Take it_, I heard Apollo's voice in my head. _And hurry up while you're at it, kiddo. They're gaining on you!_

Confused, I continued running while I fiddled with the charm. How was I supposed to take it off if it had no latch?

Apparently, that thought kind of triggered it, because I felt the chain of my necklace turned into some sort of goo, letting the charm slide right off. It thankfully turned solid again a moment later, but I didn't really notice. I was a bit too focused on the blinding light that had become a sword.

I very literally (and very stupidly) stopped in my tracks as I watched the reddish glow of the sword. It looked kind of orange and yellow, too, but mostly red. The pattern of the colors reminded me of a sunset.

Something pushed me from behind, making me release a loud "Oomph!" as I crashed onto the ground for the second time that night. I felt something sharp digging into the back of my neck, so I quickly turned around and slashed the sword through one of the empousai. It was a clean strike, going right through her torso. The empousai disappeared before I finished retracting the sword.

That last thing was actually good, because two of the telekhines (the same ones that I'd confused into smashing against each other earlier) decided it'd be fun to use the human trampoline the way the empousai had. I jumped to my feet and slashed my sword across both of them before they had time to react.

That left one telekhine and one empousai, but neither were in sight.

I stood silently, looking around for them. I didn't want yet _another_ encounter with the ground. I'm positive I swallowed some dirt back there.

I heard some tiny footsteps nearing me, so I pretended not to notice and continued looking straight ahead. I was about to turn and slash through the last telekhine, but the sound of its feet suddenly stopped, making me turn to look.

There was a guy standing there. He looked to be a few years older than me, what with his considerable height and general facial features. He had sandy blonde hair and clear blue eyes that would've made just about any girl swoon. Seeing as I was seven, though, in my case there was the fact that he had just about saved my life.

Never mind the fact that I'd already heard the telekhine coming, and I'd been about to strike at it.

The guy turned and grinned at me; he looked so calm and relaxed, as if saying: _Yep. This is perfectly normal. I do this everyday_

I wanted to laugh. _I_ used to do this every day.

Suddenly, however, my eyes widened when I noticed the last empousai, running straight towards the guy and, consequently, straight towards _me._

"Watch out!" I cried, running forwards. The empousai jerked back slightly as she realized she'd been caught. She was about to dive out of the way, but it was too late.

_Works like a charm_, Apollo said into my mind as I slashed through the last empousai. I snorted at his dumb pun.

_Err… thanks_, I thought in form of response.

I got no response, but I could somehow feel Apollo's smirk inside my head. If that makes any sense at all.

I brushed a couple of pebbles off my knees, suddenly noticing how painful it felt to have them dig into my skin. I turned around to face the blue-eyed guy, who was now staring at me and then at the spot where the empousai had been standing just a second ago.

That was when he spoke. "You know, technically speaking, _I _was saving _you_."

Although his comment was good-natured, something about its sexist nature made me glare at him, my hands rising to settle on my practically non-existent, seven-year-old hips. I was about to say something, but another voice interrupted me.

"Luke, that has _never _worked out for you." It was a girl's voice, I realized. "Quit trying."

She came into view, tattered jeans and all. She looked to be older than me, but maybe a little younger than the guy. She wore a black T-shirt that read something or other in red letters (between the darkness and my dyslexia, you can't seriously expect me to be able to read it), and there was something about her gaze that made me jump a little.

Alerted by my sudden movement, her electric blue eyes turned to look at me, her dark hair swishing with the light movement of her head. "Ignore him," she said. "It's been a while since he actually got to play hero."

"Shut up, Thalia," the guy, Luke, said.

I stared back and forth between them. "Who are you?"

The girl, Thalia, raised her eyebrows. "He called me Thalia, I called him Luke. Gee, what can you infer from that?"

I rolled my eyes. "You know what I mean."

"Well," Thalia started again, "we're _obviously _demigods, so—"

Luke cut her off. "Lay off, Thals." He turned to me. "I'm Luke, that's Thalia. We're demigods on the run, though you're obviously not." He gestured behind him, to the school. "We saw you with your friends earlier in the museum, you see. A couple monsters were about to attack you and your friends, but Thals and I got to them just in time. We've been following you since."

Thalia rolled her eyes. "You make us sound like stalkers," she said. "Look, kid. We won't bother you much, we just came to say watch out. You must be someone important, whoever your godly parent is. There were _hoards_ of monsters following you."

I nodded. "Well, thanks. I think."

Thalia studied me for a minute. Something about her gaze made me feel a little uncomfortable, but I definitely didn't show it, returning her gaze with a defiant stare.

Thalia held my gaze for a little bit and then she grinned. "I like her," she told Luke. You can imagine the look on my face. "Say, kid—"

"Annabeth," I cut her off. I didn't like being called kid. I hardly tolerated Apollo calling me 'kiddo'.

"—Annabeth," Thalia corrected, "wouldn't you like to join a top-notch group of demigods, on the run? Never knowing if you'll live to see tomorrow, sleeping with only the sky for a roof… it's the good life, you see."

I laughed. "Sounds familiar."

Luke actually looked curious about that. "It does?" Again, he looked towards the school.

"I ran away," I explained shortly. "I kind of snuck my way into enrollment here. I call it a break of sorts."

Luke nodded slowly, giving a low whistle. "How old are you, anyway? Eight? Nine?"

"Seven."

They stared. And gaped. But mostly… they stared. Quite funny, really.

Thalia got over it rather quickly. "Well, I say vacation's over. What'll it be, kid? Would you like to live like a demigod once more?"

"It's Annabeth," I corrected.

"Annabeth," Luke said. I liked how he said my name—without the somewhat sarcastic and condescending tone Thalia used. "Rephrasing Thalia's words a little bit, do you want to come with?" He kneeled down to my height and whispered in my ear: "I'm in desperate need of better company."

I laughed. I turned to look at the school—the building's outline was still visible in the moonlight. Could I leave? I knew my time at school was running out—Mrs. Warren was pressuring me about contacting the authorities—and I knew an opportunity like this wouldn't just show up.

But what about Percy? Leanne? I'd never see them again. They were my first genuine friends. And they'd made me feel welcome at school, cared for. I couldn't remember when I'd last felt like that. Never mind the fact that I'd had to lie so much to them both…

I turned to Luke and Thalia. They seemed nice enough, and they were obviously demigods—I could trust them. And I wouldn't have to lie to them. Not as much, anyway. I wouldn't want to talk about my curse, but at least with them I could be a demigod. A daughter of Athena.

_It's for the best_, Apollo said in my head. _Go with them. As the god of Prophecy, I'm telling you. Your future lies with them. Go._

I swallowed hard. Can't disobey a god, right? "Alright," I said. "I'll go with you."

* * *

The next several minutes were a blur. I agreed to meet up with Thalia and Luke on the other side of the highway, right outside of the school's main parking lot.

Then, I snuck back into the school. I knew what I had to do—I'd long since planned it, just in case. A child of Athena is always prepared. Always.

I first visited Leanne. Although I would do this to the whole school, Leanne and Percy deserved something a little more dignifying than the school's PA system.

I took my backpack from our dorm, and filled it up with my stuff. My books, my clothes, even some of my class stuff. The few things I left behind would probably disappear once I was done, anyway, so I didn't worry too much over it.

I kneeled beside Leanne's bed. "I'm sorry," I whispered. I suddenly felt the weight of what I was doing. I really would never see her again. Ever. Not once. If she passed me by in the street, she wouldn't so much as spare a glance.

I felt a couple tears roll down my cheeks. Sniffling quietly, I pushed a strand of her light blonde hair out of her face. "I'm so sorry."

I sang the tune quietly, trying not to choke on my words. A soft glow surrounded her for a moment, and just as I thought, a few of the notebooks strewn across the floor disappeared. It was done.

I stood up and walked out of my dorm for the last time, running down the halls, and then down the stairs to the boys' dorms. I snuck into Percy's dorm, careful not to wake his roommate. I knelt beside his bed, the same way I'd done with Leanne, and for a moment I just stared at him.

"Thank-you," I mumbled. He had found me. He'd brought me to the school. As sad as I was to leave, and as much as I wished I weren't going through this, I was glad he'd found me that day in the park. I'd learned a lot of things in these past couple months, about friendship, about caring, heck—I'd learned so much about myself. "Thank-you so much, Percy."

He smiled in his sleep, and muttered something. Realizing he'd said my name, I froze, thinking he was awake. But then he sighed quietly, and I exhaled. He was dreaming. Just dreaming.

I swallowed hard. "I'm sorry," I told him, the same I'd told Leanne. "You and Leanne are my best friends," I said. "Even though _you_ will, I won't ever forget that. Ever."

I wiped my tears and sniffled a little. Trying to clear my throat as quietly as I could, I sang the little tune, feeling every syllable weighing me down. "_A face, a name, a memory stain. Forget me forever; in your mind I won't stay. Some words, some days, they'll all have to fade._"

Even though I did choke on that last word, the glow still surrounded Percy. It'd worked. He turned in his sleep, muttering something unintelligible.

There. It was done.

I ran out of his dorm, not wanting to be there another minute. I couldn't take it anymore. I ran into the office, following my plan without actually realizing what I was doing. I turned on the PA system, sang my tune once more, and watched as the same golden glow filtered throughout the building.

I ran out of the school and met up with Thalia and Luke. Apparently, they hadn't noticed that, for a moment, the entire building had glowed in gold. At least, they didn't ask.

"You ready?" Luke asked me when I approached them.

I nodded. "Where to?"

Thalia pointed to the far end of the highway. "The New York border isn't very far. This city is crowded with monsters, so we want to get out of here and move further west. For now, we'll just reach the end of the highway and make camp in the woods."

"Let's go, then." I started to walk, in stride with Thalia, but then something happened. In that split second, an empousai materialized right in front of me.

I unclasped my sword, but she just shook her head and said quickly and quietly: "Beware, daughter of Athena."

Before I had time to react, the empousai was already gone.

For a moment, we were all silent, staring at the spot where the empousai had been standing. Luke broke the silence a moment later, saying: "Did that actually just happen?"

Thalia nodded, her gaze still transfixed. "A daughter of Athena, she said. I take it that's you?"

I took a minute to realize Thalia was talking about me. "Yeah," I said dumbly.

Thalia nodded. "Your mom gave you that?"

I turned to look at her, and noticed she was pointing at my sword. "Err… sort of. It's complicated. I don't want to talk about it."

Thalia stared at me oddly. For a moment she said nothing, she only started walking and beckoned us along. Then, she said: "Right. Well, does it have a name? I'm asking because there's an engraving on the side of it, but I can't see it with the whole red-glow-of-doom thing."

I actually laughed, partially because I hadn't noticed the engraving, and partially because the red-glow-of-doom thing sounded so banal and dumb. But then I realized that I couldn't read the engraving, and I didn't actually know the name.

"_ηλιακή έκλαμψη_," Apollo said in my mind.

_Right on time_, I thought. _As always_. _"Iliak Eklapse,_" I said. "Solar Flare."

This time it was Luke who raised his eyebrows. "Doesn't sound like Athena at all."

I tried to glare at Apollo in my mind. _Gee, I wonder why_. "I don't really understand it, either."

"We'll ponder that later," Thalia said. "Lights are coming on at the school, and I don't want to find out what that means. Run!"

I picked up my pace, suddenly realizing that I'd used the main exit, meaning I'd probably set off an alarm. Oops? I ran after Luke and Thalia, snapping my sword back onto my necklace, and then, for the last time, I looked back at the school.

Again, I was leaving. And, again, I wasn't ever going back.

* * *

**AN:**

**So, that was chapter 4 :) Did you like it?**

**Thank-you very much to everyone who read, and a very special thank-you to those who reviewed. I'll see you in a week!**

**-DemiSpy.**


	6. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything Rick Riordan owns, nor do I own anything you may recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general. **

* * *

**Chapter Five**

* * *

It hurts too much to talk about my times with Luke and Thalia, so I'll be as brief as I can about this.

The night they took me in, after we made a run for it and found a place to stop, we talked a lot. See, taking me in had been a bit of an impulsive decision (but what in the demigod life isn't, really?), and I knew so. That night I proved my worth—that I wasn't just some kid that would slow them down. That I was more than just another mouth to feed.

I told them about my life—before running away for the first time and afterwards. I didn't mention anything about my curse. I told them I went on luck for a lot of time, and that my mom sometimes pitched in her help. I confessed that I was leaving a lot of stuff out—stuff I just couldn't talk about.

They understood. They deemed me lucky and, although it was appropriate, I didn't feel lucky at all.

"My mom's a nutjob," Thalia said. "She couldn't handle me anymore—_I_ handled _her_. I did the sensible thing and ran away once she crossed the line. And my dad is Zeus, so it's not like I have any benefit there, either. Can't take time away from the Lord of the Sky's precious schedule, of course." She rolled her eyes.

I'd wanted to ask her what her mother did to make her run away, but decided against it. Only now was she opening up to me, and I didn't want to blow it. And it wasn't like I was answering every single question with a complete and honest answer, anyway.

"My story is sort of the same," Luke said. "I just… my mom's a good person. She just made some bad mistakes, and I was paying the price for them. I couldn't do that anymore. I don't get along with my dad, Hermes."

I nodded. I felt bad for both of them, but at the same time, I was happy, so happy, that I'd found people like me. They could know me, understand me. That meant the world to me.

Thalia studied me closely. "What's that?" she said suddenly, pointing to my necklace. "Your sword came out of there, somehow, back there when the empousai delivered her ultimatum on you. How'd that happen?"

I fingered my necklace, which I'd stupidly forgotten to vanish. "Err… it's complicated. My… my mother gave this to me, the necklace. See this charm?" I fingered it. "That's the sword. I just pull it out and it transforms. The hilt has a little squiggly thing on it, like embroidery. I just click it and it turns back into a charm."

Thalia whistled. "Talk about twenty-first century stuff."

They didn't ask any more uncomfortable questions after that. It was the start of a friendship I'll never forget.

We settled into a routine of sorts—we knew our strengths and weaknesses, what we were useful at and what we sucked at. Thalia was fast—incredibly, lightning-speed fast, with killer reflexes. Great in combat, and a terrific lookout. Luke was smart, cunning. He was great at talking—he got us out of trouble easily, sometimes with an added bonus. He knew a lot about the whole 'on the run' thing, and he was a good medic when needed (which tended to be more often than not). And I was a strategy, logic sort of smart. They counted on me to know what to do next, and to be able to think when no one else was in a condition to do so.

We were a team, and you have no idea how amazing it felt. I wasn't alone. I had a family, a somewhat dysfunctional family, with them. I was happy. We struggled, we went through some bad times, but I didn't mind. I learned a lot about life with them. They taught me to live the way I was supposed to, being who I am—a demigod.

* * *

I'm sharing this memory because it's important. It really marked my life in that special, unforgettable sort of way. It was a butterfly effect sort of thing—something so small that marked a difference in me from that moment on.

About three weeks after Luke and Thalia took me in, we were in the outskirts of a small town, right outside New Jersey. It was quite an obscure location and, so far, we hadn't run into any monsters.

That thought, of course, jinxed our luck. It wasn't too bad, we just ran into a couple of hellhounds. After the fight, we made camp. Thalia took out some cotton candy we'd been sharing that day—we got it at a small street fair we crossed paths with. She handed some to each of us and then put it away, claiming it was a prize for a 'job well done.'

"Annie," Luke called to me. Officially speaking, I hated the nickname. Secretly, though, I liked the fact that _Luke_ called me Annie. When Thalia tried to call me that, it was war. "Let me see your sword for a sec."

I frowned, but did as he said. I stuffed the last of my cotton candy into my mouth and asked: "What about it?"

He studied it, the familiar red glow lighting his face up. "It's too heavy—it's built for someone Thalia's weight, maybe even for me." He handed it back. "I've been watching you—it drags you down. You're small and light, so you should move faster than you do."

I studied my sword for a moment before clasping it back onto my necklace. It _was_ kind of heavy, but I'd been getting better at manipulating it. I was about to ask Luke to get to the point, lest his point was criticizing my sword, but then he pulled something out of his backpack.

I'd seen his dagger before. He said it was made out of Celestial Bronze, and I really liked it. It was pretty, light, and it fit really nicely in my hand the one time Luke lent it to me.

"Here," he said, handing it to me. "I don't use it much, anyway, and I think you're better off with a dagger for now." He sat up. "I expect you to wield your sword like a master when you're older, though, so don't get too excited."

Oh, but I _was_ excited. I was more than excited. A grin spread on my face, and I looked at Luke with pure adoration. Thalia later told me I looked like a lottery winner, only cheekier and less creepy. "Thank you!" I cried, not really knowing what else to say. I hugged Luke, clinging onto his neck as tight as I could.

"You're… welcome," he wheezed. "Annie… _suffocating_."

I let go and grinned. I placed a big, sloppy kiss on his cheek, the innocent type I could give him when I was just a kid. Luke grinned down at me while Thalia laughed in the background. "Some grip you've got," Luke said. "No wonder you could handle that sword so well. Holding a dagger won't be an issue for you at all."

I sat back in my spot, studying the dagger.

That dagger followed me for a long time through my life as a demigod. I honestly think that, without it, some things would've never happened—key things that marked my fate, and probably the rest of the world's fate along with it.

A lot of people never quite understood why that dagger is so important to me. It symbolized a lot of things—that I was officially a member, a true member, of Luke and Thalia's team. It marked the memory of the night when Luke gave it to me—when times were simpler and the only people that really mattered to me were Luke and Thalia.

* * *

I'd been on the run with Luke and Thalia for a couple months when they noticed it. We'd just come out of an attack, all wounded in some way or another.

"This isn't normal," Thalia said, bandaging Luke's arm, which was oozing blood and some green stuff I really don't like to remember. "I've never seen so many at once."

"You're growing up," Luke said weakly, wincing every time Thalia tugged on the bandage. "I bet your scent is getting stronger—puberty did something like that to me."

Thalia shook her head. "We started using that excuse months ago, way before we picked Annie up."

I glared at Thalia. _That_ nickname. "You're still growing, though," I pointed out. I was tending to a mild gash on my leg. The blood had stopped gushing out, but I didn't like the color it was turning. "And you guys have me now."

Thalia nodded, looking thoughtful and solemn. "Still, I don't like this. Being a daughter of Zeus usually wins out any other factor. We're getting attacked too easily—even in the most remote spots." She paused. "Annie, you're a daughter of Athena, right?"

I nodded, looking at Thalia with my brow furrowed. "I think we've established that."

Thalia let go of Luke's arm, turning to face me. She had a long gash on her cheek and another on her neck, and they were freaking me out a little. "But—I'm sorry to bring this up—you said that a lot of things about your parentage are complicated. Do you think it has something to do with this? I don't need you to tell me what; I just want to know if that's what's making our scent stronger."

I mulled over that thought. My curse _could_ make my scent stronger, but then again, wasn't it all sort of contained in my necklace? I still had my fits every other night (Luke and Thalia thought I went off to just think for a while—they understood we all had things we couldn't say aloud), but I took care to look for a small, concealed spot. And monsters never found us when I had my fits because my voice simply made them disintegrate (or so Apollo explained).

"I don't know," I told Thalia. "I think…" I trailed off.

Maybe you've never felt another person's presence in your head, but let me tell you, it's weird. Apollo barged into my head right then, and said: _Your scent isn't contained in the necklace, Annabeth. I think I forgot to mention that._

I almost rolled my eyes, but then remembered that Luke and Thalia were still looking at me. "Wait a minute," I told them, putting on my thinking face.

_Your scent is as powerful as Thalia's, maybe more. And it'll increase as you grow older. My blessing is something I don't give out lightly—in fact, the last time I gave it out was over a century ago. It's powerful, Annabeth—you're powerful._

I knew he was going to say something else, so I waited out his dramatic and ridiculously long pause.

_And, besides all that, you're a daughter of Athena. So, you smell interesting._

That was some way of putting it. _Thanks_, I sort of mumbled in my thoughts. He was out of my head in the next second.

For a moment, I wondered: how come he always popped into my head at the right time? I wasn't complaining, but I worried that he listened to every single thought of mine. That'd be plain creepy. Just to get this out there, in case I forget—I later found out that Apollo had some sort of tracker on every one of his kids, and me, that alerted him whenever we said or thought something about him.

Do you know how creepy that is? Borderline narcissistic, really.

Anyway. I finally snapped out of my thoughts and turned to Luke and Thalia, the latter of whom was actually waving a hand in front of me to catch my attention. I cleared my throat and smiled sheepishly at her. "I think it could be me, sorry. I can't explain it but… my scent is strong."

Thalia bit her lip. "Alright. At least we know it's you and not… I don't know, some other demigod trailing after us." She paused. "You're sure, right?"

I nodded. "Yeah, I'm sure."

Luke gave me a half-smile. "Think of the bright side—with all the practice we get, we'll develop some sweet skills."

Thalia and I just looked at him and laughed. Then we continued tending to our wounds.

I know I lost a bit of Thalia's trust that day. I made up for it later, but it hurt at the time—it hurt a lot. I didn't like keeping secrets from them. I had to, I knew I had to, but I didn't like it. All my life I'd had to lie somehow—the only people I'd told the honest truth had been my dad and Jane, and look at how that turned out. First I'd lied to the school, then to Percy and Leanne. I'd lied to a thousand people I found in the streets.

But, in that moment, it really hurt. I could trust Luke and Thalia on a level I'd never been able to breach with Percy and Leanne. And that made lying to them hurt even more.

* * *

We'd been on the run for exactly four months when Grover Underwood found us. He was a satyr, and he'd come on behalf of Camp Half-Blood to get us to safety.

I knew about that camp—Mom and Apollo had talked to me about it before I got into school with Percy and Leanne. I'd shot the idea down out of fear of rejection. Now that Grover had found us, I was ready. Luke and Thalia were demigods, and they'd taken me in. Surely an entire camp of demigods would also take me in, right?

Luke and Thalia were apprehensive. They agreed in the end, but they both found it hard to think their days on the run were over. Being on the run was all they knew, really. What would happen after they lost that?

They knew it was for the best, and I joined Grover into persuading them to go. So they agreed, and off we were.

Camp Half-Blood was in New York, something that brought back too many memories for me to be comfortable with. We were all the way in Chicago at the time, so we had a long journey ahead of us. Thankfully, Grover had something we tended to lack a lot—money. We took busses all the way to the Ohio/Pennsylvania border, and that was when things started to go wrong.

Monsters had followed us all the way, of course, but they started amounting as we crossed states. We ran out of the Pennsylvania bus station, looking like madmen. I remember the day because someone snapped our photograph, and I saw it on the news the next day.

See, Grover had forgotten to put his pants back on in the heat of battle, seeing as he'd actually been on a bathroom break before the attack, so the Mist made his furry legs look like... well, normal human legs. But without pants—he only had a pair of yellow undies with little ducks. To a common reporter, that's as good a story as any.

Luke complained that we didn't get the front page.

The monsters kept coming after us—those somehow didn't end up in the news, though how I've no clue—and, even though we were making good time, Grover had a small issue. It was a confidence issue, something we'd all come to understand and let pass.

The problem was that Grover was stressed. We were attacked several times a day, every day, no matter where we hid. And he got so nervous sometimes that he lost track of where we were headed.

We walked straight into a trap once—a Cyclops lair. We were so close to camp… I'm pretty sure it was a matter of one wrong turn. A single, itty bitty mistake that changed everything.

The good news about running into the trap was that the rest of the monsters lost us for a while. The bad news was, of course, that we were trapped.

We did get out, I'll tell you that. But it wasn't pretty, and that place haunted my nightmares for a long time. The really bad thing was that, well… the monsters had time to catch up to us. We were trapped for at least two days. Our final battle against the hoard of monsters was on Half-Blood Hill, right at the camp entrance.

The sky was pitch black that night, and the starts were unnaturally bright. I felt as if every single one stared down at me in that moment as I fought against the monsters. I didn't know if they were encouraging me to continue fighting, or glaring at me for taking so long. I just knew that they made me mad—why were they just watching? Why weren't they helping?

There were too many of them. Grover was trying hard to lead us up the hill, we were so close. Then it happened.

I'd never seen that look on Thalia's face. She'd looked so sure of herself. She was scared out of her wits, I knew, but in that moment, she felt completely confident in what she was about to do. She gave me one last half-smile, the type that always meant she was about to do something sneaky. Then she turned to Luke, and screamed at him to take me to safety.

He called her crazy. He called her names and he continued fighting, deliberately ignoring a serious, direct order for the first time. Thalia just looked at him with this deep stare, the type that conveyed an important message.

Tears started streaming down my face, for I was starting to understand what was going to happen. I saw a few tears leak out of Luke's eyes too.

"Go," was the last thing I heard Thalia say. Her voice didn't waver, she just looked tired.

Luke and I knew what would happen. One of us had to stay back and distract them all while the others got to safety. The only one of us with the capacity to fend them all off like that was Thalia.

Well, no. This is my secret, the one that has weighed on my conscience for years. I never told anyone about this—I'm certain only Apollo knows how I felt, how I feel about this.

I could've saved us all. I could've taken my necklace off in that moment and vanished every monster within a mile radius for good. I would've been out like a light for at least a week, but I would've survived. Thalia would've survived.

But I didn't. I knew in my gut that I couldn't. I wanted to, so badly, but I knew it wasn't right. Maybe Apollo messed with my mind in that moment; I guess I'll never know. I just know that I felt wave after wave of guilt for what I did—for what I didn't do, really—hit with a force I'd never felt. I felt that guilt for days and weeks and months and years, and it never quite faded.

Things could've been so different. I'd done the right thing, but at the time I didn't know that. I was a bad person, a horrible one. I was a bad friend. I was worth a billionth of what Thalia had been. It should've been me, the one that went down in that battle.

But no, it was Thalia.

Luke, Grover, and I crossed the border into Camp Half-Blood, and we ran down the hill. We saw the light and heard the blast—the last of those blasts I thought I'd ever hear. Thalia had summoned the last of her lightning, her final stand against the monsters. She was weak and tired, I knew it.

Something unexpected happened right then. Thalia's silhouette was falling to the ground, almost in slow motion, but she never did hit the soil.

A light erupted from inside of her, sending out a shockwave that knocked the three of us to the ground. I watched, mesmerized, as the light expanded, bigger, brighter. I couldn't see Thalia anymore, and I had to look away so as to retain my eyesight.

When the light died down, everything was silent, so silent, I thought I'd gone deaf. But then I heard a rustle next to me, Luke moving around in the grass. I looked up and saw it: a tree. The monsters were all gone, and the only remainder of our battle was that pine tree, a memorial of my best friend.

It stood tall and proud, and I felt as if it were watching me, just like the stars earlier. That tree came to mean a lot of things to me. For some time, I'd go and sit next to it in the afternoons. I never said a word, I just sat there next to it, never leaning against it.

The last time I visited the tree like that was about six months after the attack, when my visits were more random and less routinely. I'd finally rationalized through my guilt and, even though it would haunt me for ages, I'd learned to understand and control it. All I had to do was seal that into place.

So that afternoon, I placed my palm against the base of the tree and said: "I'm sorry I didn't save you."

A breeze picked up in that moment, and the tree's leaves rustled. I didn't know if it was a coincidence or not, but that was okay. One way or another, I knew Thalia had heard. I just knew it.

* * *

Apollo once gave me authorization to tell Luke about my curse. It'd been a couple days after Thalia's death, when I was feeling very, very down. My siblings at the Athena cabin avoided me, mostly because they didn't want to mess up and hurt me on accident. But, good as their intentions were, I felt very alone.

The rest of camp did more or less the same thing for a few days, but then they started to approach me. My very first friend was an Aphrodite girl named Silena—she was the sweetest, nicest person I'd ever met. She showed me around camp and gave me my first manicure. She taught me a few things about guys.

She was a friend to me, and that's what really made a difference.

Luke and I didn't talk to each other much. We were both grieving Thalia, and we knew it was something we had to do alone—particularly Luke. He was so down for a long time. Even as I started to move on, he kept on singling himself out. He spent hours and hours training and practicing with his sword. He ran around the lake for several hours at random intervals every day.

I knew why he was doing it. It was one of those gut feelings I got around him. I knew he was trying to improve his skills, because he felt guilty. He felt the same guilt I'd been feeling for days on end—that if we'd fought, if we'd been stronger, stealthier, we could've saved Thalia. He could've saved Thalia.

I wanted to trust Luke then, more than I ever had. In my mind, I only had him left. I'd made friends at camp, true, but Luke was the one that genuinely mattered to me. More than ever, I wanted to tell him everything, to know he knew all of me. It was a strange sort of logic, but it was my train of thought at the time. And I once prayed to Apollo, asking for permission to tell Luke.

I'd already told Chiron about my curse. He'd arranged for a spot in the woods for me, a little cave where I could have my fits in peace. I figured that if Chiron could know, then so could Luke. I barely knew Chiron. He inspired trust in me, for sure, but Luke was different. I knew him. He had the right to know me.

Apollo took a week to answer, but his answer was yes, and that was all that mattered to me.

My next obstacle was, of course, getting Luke's attention. He still wasn't doing well. He'd lost weight and grown muscle, a bad combination in my opinion. There were dark circles under his eyes, and his gaze was always the same: wild, lost, desperate.

I don't know what went through his head during those few weeks. I can honestly say I don't want to know.

Every time I tried to talk to Luke, he only half-listened to me. He once even snapped at me, though he apologized afterward. Still, I knew he was unreachable at the moment. And it was selfish of me, really, to even want to bother his mind with something else. He already had a lot on his plate—what made me think I had the right to give him more to think about? He would worry over me, too. I was sure of it. I didn't want that.

I resolved to tell him someday much, much later, someday when he'd finally accepted Thalia's passing the way I'd been starting to. I thought that maybe I should really get over it as well, before I tried to go on such an emotional ordeal.

I had fits every day during that time. I wrote music about Thalia, everything from pages and pages of lyrics to a few scattered notes and tunes. I wrote music about everything that went through my head during that time. It was a dark era for me—and, to think, I'd only just turned eight.

I still have a binder with all that music. I used to leaf through it sometimes, smiling down at my childish scrawl, biting my lip every time I read over lyrics that brought memories to life. I don't do it anymore—I've since learned that it's not okay to dwell on the past.

At the time I didn't know that, of course, so dwelling on the past was all I did during the first few months of my eighth year.

* * *

I mentioned Apollo gave me permission to tell Luke about my curse, but that I decided to put it off indefinitely—at least until Luke and I recovered from our dark era. I was okay with that. I remember I reached that conclusion the night before my eighth birthday. It helped me feel more at peace with myself the next day.

A week after my birthday, Apollo visited me in dreams. He said he'd had a vision.

He told me to keep quiet about my curse, especially with Luke. He said even he didn't understand his vision, the premonition of sorts that told him to warn me. He just knew that it was dangerous to tell Luke about my curse—maybe someone would be listening in while I told him? He didn't know, but he didn't want to risk it.

It was that day when I finally figured it out. Apollo had given me the curse with one purpose, stupid as it was—getting back at my mom. But the Fates would've never let him curse—bless—me if there wasn't a reason, a genuine reason behind it.

The dreams didn't help. I had nightmares every now and then—they got considerably more frequent as I grew older. I always heard a very neutral voice; it could've been male or female, old or young. I didn't know. But it always said the same phrase, and the tone was sinister, even though there was a laugh hidden in there: _You shall be slain by your own sword._

Here's some food for thought, though, aside from the voice in my dreams. Apollo said he only gave this blessing to one of his children every once in a while—for him, that was the equivalent of "every other century or so". And when I finally decided to look into it, I realized that all those children had done something important—not becoming Elvis or Marie Curie or anything of the sort, which was what his children did most of the time. His blessed children were destined for something on the worldwide scale.

I wasn't his child, and in my opinion, I was cursed. I didn't know how that affected the grand scheme of things, but I did know that I still had a role to play.

And that was when I finally understood that maybe it wasn't the role I'd pictured, whatever that may have been.

* * *

**AN:**

**So, things are moving a little faster now. I hope you like where the story's going, especially seeing as this chapter gave me migraines for quite a while.**

**Quick note: I've noticed the hit count for this story dropping significantly, something I'd never seen happen so fast before, so I'd like to know: is there anything I could do to improve this story? Review or PM me with any feedback on this, please :) This story is my baby, the very first fic I ever wrote, so I really want things to go well for it.**

**Thanks for reading, and very special thanks to my reviewers, who never cease to brighten my day. **

**See ya!**

**-DemiSpy.**

**PS. There won't be an update until the Tuesday after the next one (aka, till May 14). I'll be out on some personal business and don't want to have to worry about the week's chapter till I'm back. Sorry, I hope you'll understand.**


	7. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything Rick Riordan owns, nor do I own anything you may recognize.**

**Claimer: I own my plot and my work in general.**

* * *

**Chapter Six**

* * *

Luke never did quite recover from Thalia's death—he still trained himself to exhaustion, and he occasionally fell into a trance of sorts, staring into space while his fists clenched and unclenched. Sometimes, his eyes watered a bit.

I recovered in my own way, I guess. I just pushed myself to move on. I visited her tree every now and then. Also, every year, on the anniversary of her death, Luke and I spent the entire afternoon seated beside her tree. We were quiet the whole time, but there was this atmosphere around us—an understanding or sorts that let us know we were thinking the exact same things.

Luke and I remained really good friends. Although I did have a crush on him, it was the sort of thing I would never, ever admit to anyone. Not even myself. I didn't like to think about it—sure, I admired Luke a great deal, and he was nice to me and took me seriously. I earned myself a reputation at camp—I was respected and everyone knew not to mess with me (or my stuff). But Luke was always there for me and he was the only person I allowed to touch my stuff and tease me and call me Annie.

So I'd come to terms with having a crush on him, now, at age twelve, I just made sure not to let it get in the way. He saw me as a little sister—well, fine. I knew he'd always liked Thalia better, anyway. He always protected me, he helped Thalia. He always kept me out of trouble—he and Thalia dealt with trouble.

In his eyes, I was always one level below him. Just one level—most others were at least three. Still, for some ridiculous reason, I'd always seen him superior. I admired him—aren't all the people one admires far greater than one?

With that mindset, I started to focus on other things. I got along great with my siblings, for the most part anyway, and by the time my fifth summer at camp arrived, I was cabin leader even though I was among the younger ones. I also knew essentially everyone at camp, and everyone at camp knew me. I had role, a position. And I loved the feeling of security that gave me, even if keeping up with expectations sometimes gave me migraines.

Chiron became a father figure for me, and I learned to trust him better than I did anyone—better than I trusted Luke. He understood my curse, my 'little problem' as we called it in public, and he helped me through a lot of things because of that. When puberty began to assault me one summer back, my curse not only intensified to the point that I had fits _every day _instead of every other day or every third day, but it also had some… strange effects on me.

Sometimes, if I missed one of my fits or had an unusually large… 'charge', let's call it, of power, I got moody and cranky and unusually strong. Training with me on those days was dangerous. I once blew up, landing one of my fits in the middle of the campfire. Thankfully, Chiron somehow manipulated the Mist so that even demigods could be fooled by it (a rare ability he didn't like talking about) and from there on I decided to hide in my cave for at least an hour every day.

Everyone had a different theory. The official story was that I spent time with Chiron, helping plan camp activities and whatnot, but hardly anyone believed it nowadays. Even with my invisibility cap (which, by the way, my mom gave to me for my twelfth birthday), people somehow spotted me walking into the woods after dinner every day. I didn't bother setting the rumors straight, knowing it would only cause more questions and more rumors to arise.

It was a sort of taboo subject at camp—Annabeth's disappearances. I always felt _so_ special about it.

Anyhow, speaking of my cave, I'd like to zoom in on how that was working out for me. The only other person at camp that knew about my curse, besides Chiron and myself, was Lee Fletcher, the head of the Apollo cabin.

When Apollo first denied me the right of telling Luke about my curse, I sort of adjusted to the idea, but the pressure of keeping such a big secret started to weigh on me after a while. I talked to Apollo about it, and he told me I could talk with one of his sons: Lee. He said Lee would keep the secret, and he could also help me putting my 'blessing' to good use. That was around the time I was about to turn nine.

Lee was a year-round camper, like me, which was a major advantage. We met up in my cave on Saturday mornings. I found that practicing music with him reduced the likeliness of my having a fit later on in the night, or at least the extremity with which it came out. We considered meeting up daily for some time, but found it too troublesome—especially during the summer, when the amount of campers tended to skyrocket.

At some point, people started noticing that Lee and I always disappeared at the same hour on Saturdays. I could deal with rumors just fine, but I didn't want to get others involved. So I talked to Chiron about his Mist manipulation thing and, after about three or four weeks of nonstop pestering, he agreed to make sure that people stopped wondering about that.

I couldn't believe it worked. Lee was also partially affected—Chiron made sure he never wondered why people didn't notice.

These things sometimes bothered me—was my life just a tangled web of lies? I always had to lie because of my curse, make up excuses… manipulate others into thinking what I wanted them to think. I'd learned to use my curse for my benefits. If I put effort into it, singing little tunes could make people do or think or say what I wanted them to.

I didn't do it often, for the sake of my morals.

Anyhow, that's a bit of a dark topic I don't want to touch upon right now. Back to Lee and my cave, please.

One of those Saturdays really marked my life. As per usual, at eight am I was already out of my cabin and running through the woods. My cave was at a particularly remote spot, where no one usually ventured to when playing Capture the Flag. It was far past the creek, almost touching the woods' border.

Once I arrived at my cave, I gently pressed my hand onto the rocky surface and muttered the Greek word for _open_, ανοίγω.

Part of the rock vanished, leaving me facing the usual circular entrance. I ducked and walked down the steps and into my safe haven, taking off my invisibility cap and hanging it on its usual peg by the entrance.

The walls were completely covered with posters, papers, and pictures, all in perfect order and coordination. The beige carpet that covered the floor was the messy one—littered with paper and pencils and books and notebooks and just about everything in between. There were two chairs at either end of the room, which was spacious enough for two, maybe three, but would never fit more.

There were my bookshelves to the left, where I stored all my lyrics and music sheets along with some books for light reading just in case. To the right, all the instruments and some of Lee's own music, all stored into cabinets and shelves. Most of the space in the room was occupied by a piano which, while not as grand as some of the models in the Apollo cabin (I had no clue how they managed to fit those in there), was our pride and joy.

We also had a box full of snacks and candy. Good stuff.

Lee arrived a little late that day. When he arrived at about eight fifteen, he found me going through one of my old lyrics notebooks. "Hey," he said. "Sorry I'm late—had to break something up before I came."

"The Stoll brothers?" I asked.

"Of course," he said. He sat at his chair and took his lyre from its safe spot in the cabinets—we had a bunch of those at camp, but his was special: Apollo gave it to him as a gift on the tenth anniversary of his arrival at camp. Some rumored it was literally _Apollo's lyre_, as in, the original one from the myths.

Lee wasn't sure.

"Let's see," I said, picking up my binder. I stored all my scrap notes and loose papers in there. It was almost full—I'd have to take time one of those days to start leafing through it all and starting to properly store it in notebooks and folders. "We finished working on your piece last week, and I have no pending ideas, so I guess today we improvise."

Lee nodded. "Hmm… I remember you once told me you wanted to go through some of our old work; we could get a head start on that."

I thought about the notebook I'd been going through a few minutes ago. "I have some lyrics that could improve some," I said, picking the notebook up. "And some songs that never got proper sheet notes"

"That works," he said. "What have we got?"

I lifted a finger and started to go through the notebook. This was one of my oldest—most of this I'd written when I was nine. I stopped on one song. "This one," I said, handing the notebook to Lee. "I bet you remember it."

He stared at my nine-year-old scrawl and whistled. "This stuff is _ancient_," he said. He studied the page. "You were really down that day…" he murmured. "Wouldn't say why, though."

I pried the notebook away. "And I still won't," I said. "I want to work on it, though. I got so annoyed at you that we never worked on the music. And you didn't dare bring it back up during the following weeks."

Lee laughed. "I remember that, too." He sat up and studied the instruments at his side, all in their cases and cabinets. "That song was really slow," he said. "I'm thinking piano or acoustic guitar. Or flute."

"Piano," I said, remembering the rhythm. "We can add a beat later."

He thought about it. "Okay, then." He stood up and made his way through our mess of a floor, taking a seat at the stool before the piano. "Sing the first part—I'll try some notes and then we'll figure out the rest."

I nodded. "Ready?"

He nodded. "Just—one thing, Annabeth."

I frowned. "What?"

He gave me a lopsided smile, the type that usually meant I'd soon enough be rolling my eyes. "Please don't, don't go all emotional on me like the last time you sang that."

I stuck my tongue out at him. "Ever so compassionate," I said. He just laughed, so I rolled my eyes (told you!) and turned to face my old, messy scrawl. I'd written the song during a fit one day I'd been going down memory lane. It was a very strong fit, lasting far past the usual hour I took. Songs I wrote during fits usually came out more mature than what I tended to write on my own, but this one came out on an extreme. Almost… tense. I'd never touched it up, unlike most of my songs. It said everything it needed to say.

_Been long since passed, the day I said goodbye,  
The day you remained silent with only I knowing why.  
Been quite a while, though you cannot recall,  
You never could and I know you never will at all._

_So meet me in my memory, standing in the rain,  
Listening to the music that yours was to condemn.  
Say the words I'd dreamt of, the ones I wish you'd say,  
And know I'll always remember what you had to forget.*_

* * *

Unfortunately for Lee, I did go a little emotional on him. We did get the music done, though, and he was tactful enough to abstain from joking around while I tried to keep flood at bay.

Lee and I headed off to breakfast after that, and so my day began. I had a meeting with all the other cabin heads about the summer campers starting to arrive and whatnot of that sort. Then I went to lunch, trained with a few of my siblings, and then met up with Luke at the beach. We usually spent Saturday afternoons there, just talking.

For a while we both sat in the sand, silent. I knew the look on his face the moment I arrived at the beach—he was thinking too much again. So I waited for him to speak up, which he eventually did.

"Have you ever felt like everyone is subconsciously glaring a hole into your back? Like, they're not necessarily glaring at you, really glaring, but there's this unspoken rift between you and the rest of the world that you just can't—get—past."

I thought about that. I had a good idea as to what he was thinking about, but I had to be careful with what I said if I didn't want him to run out on me. He did that when he thought he was on the border of blowing up, just to make sure he didn't say anything stupid that could make us enter a stupid argument.

We'd had plenty of those before.

"I guess I have," I said. "Back when I lived with my dad, maybe." Luke knew my dad was a touchy subject, so he didn't ask questions. A nagging part in my head wanted to tell him how I _always_ felt like that, how I felt that everyone somehow _knew_ about all the times I'd lied to them, covering my tracks, and that they were internally cursing at me, waiting for me to spit the truth out so they could openly glare at me.

But I knew I couldn't say that, so I resorted to this: "I sometimes feel people are waiting for me to just say… something. Like everyone's waiting for me to speak up about something they just don't dare confront me about." I paused. "Is that what you meant?"

He took a long time to answer. "Yeah. I just…" he sighed. "My dad visited the Stolls in dreams a few days ago. He wanted them to go on a quest for him. I didn't get the details, but I do know Chiron said no."

I knew it. I took a few minutes to answer—partly because I knew he was thinking hard and most likely wouldn't fully listen, and partly because I needed to be really careful with what I said here. "You think they blame you."

"I _know_ they blame me," Luke said. "Annie, they've been pulling some nasty pranks all week—it's not even funny anymore. They're taking it out on everyone else. And it's my fault."

"Have they pulled any pranks on you?"

"No, which just goes to show, because everyone else in cabin eleven has been pranked at least _once_."

I bit my lip. "Luke, even if they did blame you, we all know—including them—that the blame can't just fall on you. It's not yours to take. And it's not Chiron's, either."

"Whose is it, then?" he was starting to get mad. "Huh? Who should I tell the Stolls to punch?"

"It's no one's, Luke. There's nothing to be blaming anyone about. If you want to get technical about it, you need to stop blaming yourself. I think that, at this point, you're the only one that does." He was about to say something, but I cut him off. "Yes, Luke, everyone blamed you at first. But then the full story got out and everyone just _understood_, okay? We're all your friends and we all know you, Luke. Yes, the Stolls are mad. I'm not going to tell you they're not. But, for one, they're not necessarily mad at _you_, and even if they are, they won't be in a week's time. We all know it.

"You need to understand that we all get it. Yes, the Stolls lost their chance, but Chiron is just looking out for them. Even before you left on your quest, Luke, he'd denied quests to others. He made sure they had a certain skill level—now he's just a bit more demanding than he used to be, and you can't blame yourself for that either. The world gets more dangerous, more exigent with every passing day, and _that's_ why Chiron demands more from us.

"The only thing you did in this, because you _did_ have a role, was prove that we needed some changes around here. The fact that you came out alive proves that our old standards were still good. The fact that you had bruises meant that it'd be a good idea to raise them a little.

"Things have been weird since Christmas, Luke, and you know it. Things were getting weird way before that, too. The world around us is changing big time, and Chiron knows it. Stop pounding yourself for something you didn't cause."

Luke took a long time to answer, time I used to go over my words and make sure I didn't say something stupid. Finally, he spoke up: "Okay."

I knew he wasn't going to say much more on the matter, but I was glad that, to some extent, I'd gotten through to him. I looked up at the darkening sky—dinner would come soon enough.

I took Luke's hand and gave it a light squeeze, then stood up and brushed the sand off my shorts and legs. "C'mon," I told Luke.

"Go on ahead," he said. "I'll be there in a minute."

I nodded and started to walk away, but I hadn't made it two steps before he stretched up and lightly grabbed my arm. "Thanks, Annie," he said.

I gave him a small smile. Then, much more satisfied with myself, I turned around and walked away.

* * *

After dinner, I headed off to my cave for my fit. Even though I'd blown off a good deal of steam that morning, I still needed to make sure.

However, even after I took off my necklace and seated myself comfortably in my chair, nothing came. I occupied myself by humming to some or other tune, reading through one of my just-in-case books. About twenty minutes later, I reached the conclusion I wasn't going to have a fit that night.

I'd had a rather emotionally stressful day, so I decided to head back and treat myself to an extra half an hour of sleep.

Just as I was making my way through the forest, I heard it. Loud and clear, the sound echoed through the woods. _Thump. Thump. _

I stopped in my tracks and listened closely. _Thump_. Where was it coming from?

_Thump._

I had my hat on, so that was a bonus. _Thump. _I didn't have my dagger though.

The noise suddenly stopped. I heard a loud screech, like metal on metal, and that was when I heard the growl. Loud, strong, and dangerous were the first adjectives that crossed my mind.

I made a split-second decision. The monster, whatever it was, sounded faraway. It wasn't in the woods, and I wasn't the target. So I did the only logical thing and ran.

I ran through the woods as fast as my legs let me go. I thought about going to my cabin to retrieve my dagger, but left that idea aside. I could pick up another one or a sword by the arena—everyone left those lying around on weekends.

I took a slight detour to the arena, where I found a simple celestial bronze dagger, not quite as sharp or light as mine, but good enough. Then I kept on running, all the way to the Big House, where I assumed I'd find campers battling off whatever monster had managed to get past the hill. It was a rare occurrence—but not impossible.

To my surprise, no one was there. Chiron was making his way out of the Big House, but other than him, the area was silent.

I heard the growl again, but this time it was cut off—sudden and sharp.

Chiron noticed me approaching, and he gestured to Half-Blood Hill, where a distinctive shower of golden dust was slowly fading. I stood frozen in my spot for a couple of seconds, until I saw two figures coming down the hill; one was unconscious, and its silhouette looked vaguely familiar…

I regained feeling in my legs and ran towards Chiron who was standing very, very still on the Big House porch. "What…" I tried to catch my breath. "What happened?"

Chiron didn't turn to look at me. "Minotaur," he said, very quietly.

Chiron rarely addressed monsters by their names. I tried not to gape as I processed that. _Minotaur…_ "Chiron, who is that? Is it…?"

He knew who I was speaking of, of course. He'd been attending a 'house call', as he put it, during the past few months. Some powerful demigod that Grover had supposedly found…

Grover! That's why his silhouette looked familiar.

Upon closer inspection, I realized that Grover was unconscious, being dragged by the other kid. He was crying, screaming about something unintelligible. I stood frozen in place as he came closer—his features looked kind of… familiar.

He was but a few feet away when it finally dawned on me. His hair was still that black that used to make him look extra spooky when he, Leanne and I got together at night to tell horror stories. His eyes were still that deep green that always made me curious, and they were glinting with every tear that came out.

He dropped to his knees, which in turn made Grover fall on his back beside him. I opened my mouth, but the gasp never came out, replaced by some sort of strangled choke stuck in halfway through my throat. I wanted to run and help, but my legs weren't responding, and I couldn't quite feel my feet. Chiron didn't move, either

Everything about him screamed at me. As he crouched onto his knees, panting, I felt something cringe inside my chest and stomach. My eyes stung a little.

He started crawling towards us, until he finally collapsed at my feet (and Chiron's), with Grover at his side. I regained my senses right then, but I kept still. I stared at him for what seemed like an eon, until I finally found my voice and said: "He's the one. He has to be."

Chiron was more or less in the same state as I, though I figured for very different reasons. "Silence, Annabeth. He's still conscious. Bring him inside."

I took a moment to stare a little longer, to gather my thoughts and try to form a conclusion. Chiron, too, seemed too awestruck to properly act.

His breathing evened out a little as his eyes fluttered shut, and I managed one last glimpse at the deep green irises that had haunted me for so many years. I blinked back tears. _Welcome to Camp Half-Blood, Perseus Jackson._

As I stared at the now unconscious form of my best friend, helping Chiron pull him up and into the Big House, I thought of the song I'd been singing that morning.

_So meet me in my memory, standing in the rain,  
Listening to the music that yours was to condemn.  
Say the words I'd dreamt of, the ones I wish you'd say,  
And know I'll always remember what you had to forget._

I still remembered.

* * *

**AN:**

***I made that up for story purposes exclusively, so please don't plagiarize (Claimer: It's my work and I own it.) and don't go looking for a song that doesn't exist :P In that same sense, my experience with songwriting is slim to none so let's pretend that what I wrote there is awesome and Apollo's-blessing-worthy. Annabeth's talent is freaking awesome. I'm not Annabeth. Let's go with that mindset, yeah?**

**Don't have much time today, so this isn't edited okay? The only errors should be wording and grammar and the like, all of which I'll correct over the next few days. Sorry!**

**Thanks for reading! And thank-you very, very much to those who review. You really make a difference. **

**See you next Tuesday!**

**-DemiSpy.**

* * *

**Guest1 and Guest2: Thanks to both of you! Means a ton!**


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